Training Daze, A Crossover Fanfic of the Dresden Files
by ellf
Summary: Harry just can't get any time off, can he? A short while after Dead Beat, Harry has Warden work to do, and Harry is surprisingly resilient to change.
1. Chapter 1

Training Daze, A Crossover Fanfic of the Dresden Files

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By Ellf  
Chapter One

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Disclaimer: I do not own any of the intellectual property found within this fanfic. All belong to their respective content creators. Dresden Files is authored by Jim Butcher, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a creation of Joss Whedon.

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The day started with my home phone ringing. Not that it's strange or anything. I'm sure people are woken up by phones all the time. Admittedly, I _had_ expected to get woken by my Mickey Mouse alarm clock, but I had just wrapped up a case a few days ago and had been planning on taking the next few days off for some much-needed R &R. Or perhaps I would have been woken up by Mister, my cat, as he asked in his own forceful manner for food. Mouse would have been a welcome wake-up call as well, but the dogasaurus probably bothered Thomas into walking him.

No, instead I had to get woken by a phone call. On my day off. Stars and Stones, I needed to get an answering service for my house the way I did my office. I got out of bed and blearily made my way out of my bedroom toward the kitchen.

With a mutter of " _Flickum Bicus,_ " I channeled the tiniest bit of magic to ignite all of my candles. The phone gave the faintest of chirps as I cast the spell, but it continued to ring. Damn. Guess I'd have to answer it after all.

"What?" I put all the tired and gruff grumpy wizard I could into my answer of that phone. Hells Bells, I hadn't even had my caffeine yet. I pulled at the cord to the phone and idly wondered if I could get to my icebox and pull a Coke out without disconnecting it.

"Hello, Harry, I assume I woke you?" The voice on the other end of the line was male and familiar. There was an air of patience to his voice that made me feel a bit guilty for the way that I'd snapped at him. Of course, priests tended to manage to pull that off quite well.

Mister chose that moment to ram his shoulder into my leg, and I put the phone's receiver onto my shoulder as I answered. "I should have been up anyway. How can I help you, Father Forthill?"

"I need the advice of someone of your persuasion, Harry. Would it be possible for you to come down to St. Mary's today?" I winced a little. I hadn't been down to the church since the time the Denarians had tried to take the Shroud of Turin. I'd been avoiding Father Forthill and my friend Michael since that day, for good reason. I rubbed my gloved left hand with my right, my thumb passing over the sigil that was the only good patch of skin there. Good reason indeed. Still, Father Forthill had been there for me in the past; I couldn't ignore his need.

"Sure, I haven't got anything on the schedule. How about around…." Damn, it was that late already? Thomas was going to give me all sorts of hell when he found out. "Is around five good for you?"

"I suppose that'd probably be best. It's after afternoon Mass, so you should be fine for getting in." I still wasn't sure what this was about. I figured I better ask while I still had him on the phone.

"What's this about, Father? You don't usually need someone like me." Forthill's tried to convert me before, but with my little problem, I doubt that I'd be good for it anyway. Plus, there was something about that 'suffer not a witch to live' that always stuck with me.

"I need you for your investigative skills, Harry. I can't really tell you much over the phone, but this has to do with Shiro." Shiro. That was a name I hadn't heard since… probably the last time I saw Forthill. The man had died taking a curse upon himself that was meant for me, and in the process, he managed to allow us time to prevent the bulk of the Americas from becoming a plague-ridden wasteland. He was the former wielder of my umbrella stand's current occupant, _Fidelacchius_ , and he was a very good man. Dead, but still very good.

"I'll be there, Father. Five o'clock." I put a bit of conviction into my voice. It wasn't that hard. If this was something to do with Shiro, there really wasn't much good that it could be if Forthill was calling me. The former Knight of the Cross deserved better than that.

"See you then, Harry." Forthill hung up the phone, and shortly afterward, so did I. Before I did anything else, I made my way over to my icebox and pulled out a nice cold can of Coca-Cola. It was too early in the day to drink anything else, and I sipped the glorious nectar of the gods. I grabbed a second can and poured it into a bowl for Mister while I rummaged around for food for him and Mouse.

The latter of which, I practically tripped over while getting out his food bowl. For a dog his size, Mouse is surprisingly stealthy. Smiling at him, after steadying myself, I reassured him. "I know, Thomas probably fed you already, but I'm going to do it again in case he didn't. Then I'll take you out with me."

Mouse huffed in acknowledgement, and when I placed the bowl down, he started to eat. Mister bounded into the kitchen shortly afterward, and after shouldering my shin, he too turned to eat. Now, Mister being some thirty-odd pounds of cat, he had me grabbing the counter to stabilize myself, and no sooner did I catch the counter than the phone started to ring again.

I didn't let it ring too long this time, and I was a bit more polite. "Harry Dresden's house, Harry Dresden speaking…"

"Warden Dresden…" A beautiful young female voice responded with the hint of an Italian accent. I of course recognized her off the bat. Captain Luccio, the person who had deputized me with the grey cloak in the first place. I'd failed her last Halloween, which had her end up in a highly attractive blonde's body with less magic, but Luccio was still a highly experienced Warden of the White Council. She still had her knowledge and skills that she could pass on. She'd been planning on starting a training facility the upcoming Summer to train new Wardens. I managed to get roped into helping out with that. "Mine eye hath played the painter and hath steeled."

Code phrase, code phrase… where did I put that book of responses? The response wasn't supposed to be the next line of the sonnet, but the second line of the sonnet two sonnets later. Ah, there it was… I gave the appropriate response, and then said, "Captain Luccio, what's up?"

"First, I would like to pass on some congratulations. Wardens Yoshino and Ramirez both passed on information regarding what you faced in defense of the Venatori last month. Stronger men have taken on what you did and lost their minds."

"Well, some would say that mine is already gone, Captain. Morgan especially."

" _Warden_ Morgan's opinions notwithstanding, you deserve praise for that, but clearly that isn't the only reason for my call." Luccio continued.

"No, not what I expected. Especially with you being the one to call, Captain Luccio." The only person who'd be worse calling would be Morgan, but that would be for entirely different reasons.

"Wardens Yoshimo and Ramirez have expressed interest in seeing your usual methods after seeing you in action. They are headed to Chicago as we speak by train." Luccio paused. "They are bringing two trainees with them whom I feel could benefit from your knowledge."

Great. While I liked Ramirez, and Yoshimo was pretty useful in a pinch, this was supposed to be a short time for some R&R. Add that two Wardens-in-training were coming along? This was going to be severely awkward. I didn't even have a case to show them. Father Forthill notwithstanding, of course.

Pinching the bridge of my nose, I asked, "When will their train arrive?"

"Seven PM tonight at Union Station, Central Standard Time, of course. I'm sure I do not need to impress the need for punctuality upon you, Warden. They should be secure…"

"But the Reds have shown up where they weren't wanted before. Got it, Captain." I really hated the Red Court sometimes, and they had managed to hit the Wardens hard last Halloween. The war effort required new trainees and new battle-capable Wizards, but the White Council just didn't have as many people ready as possible. It's why they recruited me, after all.

"Be sure that you do. Safe travels, Warden." Luccio hung up at that point. Okay, now that that was done, I finally had time to have some breakfast. Hell's Bells, I just needed to wake up some more. I sipped my Coke and poured myself a bowl of cereal.

As I ate my cereal, I went over the day's plans. At five I needed to see Father Forthill about something related to Shiro Yoshimo, and then I needed to go pick up the Wardens and the WITs at the train station two hours later. This was shaping up to be less of a restful day and more of a workday. The only thing that could make it more of one would be if-

The phone rang again. Three people wanting to contact me in one day. What were the odds?

Picking up the phone, I answered, "Harry's House of Hoary Hosts, for all your hoary needs…"

What? I was still a bit groggy. The Coke hadn't kicked in yet.

"Dresden, you're a pig."

"Good morning to you too, Murph. What's up?" Ah, Karrin Murphy. The cutest little Detective Sergeant that you ever could see. Not that I'd ever say it to her face without proper provocation. Such things were just not done.

"I need you at the Sheraton Hotel over on Fifth Ave. As soon as you can make it, Harry." Well, that was something interesting. Murphy hadn't needed to call me in on any jobs for SI in a while. The city just didn't like paying me all too often since the Larry Fowler incident.

"Murph, if you wanted a date with me, you just needed to ask, but what would Kincaid say?" The byplay between us was important. It was a part of our ritual with each other.

"Dresden, I'm going to pretend you didn't say that. Just… get down here. There's a couple of bodies that I need you to look at before they get moved." Murphy's voice was pretty professional throughout, but I knew my friend. Something wasn't right about these bodies, and I needed to see the scene while they were there.

"I'll be there in twenty minutes, Murph. Don't worry." I reassured her. It was all I could do on the phone.

"Twenty minutes, Dresden. I'll be waiting for you." The line went dead. So, Father Forthill, young Wardens, and now at least two dead bodies. I guess the idea of rest and relaxation was off the table for now.

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When I said twenty minutes to Murphy, I hadn't been kidding. While normally, the Blue Beetle doesn't really do all that well if you try to take her over sixty, the Beetle was in the shop, and I was using one of Mike's loaner cars. Mike may have been a miracle worker, but even he had at least a week turnaround when having to deal with the damage induced by a horde of angry gnomes. I hadn't even been the one to piss them off, but they took it out on my car. My car! Is there no justice in the world?

The loaner that Mike had given me for the time being was an old Army Jeep that he'd had sitting around the shop for a while. It was perhaps maybe five years younger than the Beetle, and it had a lot more room for my legs. Of course, I absolutely hated it. The Beetle had it beat by leaps and bounds, but the Jeep was old enough that unlike Billy Borden's car, I'd be able to drive this one more than five miles before it started barking at me that the door was ajar when it was shut tight. Magic interferes with technology, you see, the newer, more complex the technology, the worse that it gets messed up. Billy's poor satnav never had a chance.

I couldn't take Mouse with me, as much as I wanted to. This was an official crime scene, and there were going to be police everywhere. As much as he sheds, my dog would probably contaminate the crime scene. I had left a note for Thomas to make sure to walk Mouse when he got back, and got in the Jeep to get to the crime scene. Fifth Avenue wasn't all that far from my place, and allowing for traffic it would have taken me maybe ten minutes on a bad day to get there. I made it there in record time, shaving maybe two minutes thanks to lucky timing at a stoplight, and made it. There it was, obvious from the police cars.

Oh, and of course, the tiny blonde woman standing next to the cars themselves, looking at the road. Lieutenant Karrin Murphy was the current head of SI, that's Special Investigations to the layperson. Chicago's Special Investigations unit was the unit that handled all sorts of strange things from the natural to the supernatural and they managed to report it in words that the upper brass could handle. It wasn't a vampire, but instead a gang member on PCP. It wasn't magical fire, it was swamp gas with fireworks. That sort of thing. They typically saddled detectives that they wanted to drum out of the force but couldn't find good cause with the job, and the typical detective lasted maybe a year. Murphy had lasted nearly a decade at this point, thanks in no small part to her willingness to hire a certain Wizard out of a certain phone book.

Today Murphy wore her hair up in a tight bun, a leather jacket, some thick but serviceable winter pants to combat the falling December snow and some sensible boots for working in. By contrast, I wore some jeans, a tee shirt that said "Han Shot First" and my long leather duster. Hanging on a thong on the inner flap of my duster was my blasting rod, and in the back of Mike's loaner, I had my staff. I looked almost longingly at it when I went around back to retrieve a small duffel bag. I'd gone to park the Jeep (man, I needed a better name for it) in the parking lot across the street. It hadn't taken long, and thanks to my large stride, I was meeting Murphy at the tape within a few minutes.

She greeted me with a small smile and waved me through the police tape. "I kept looking for your clunker of a car, but I didn't see you drive in."

"The Beetle's in the shop. Mike lent me a Jeep until it's ready." I tried for a bit surly as I answered, but the chill made it a little hard to accomplish.

"Ah, so you have a car that's big enough that you don't look ridiculous getting out of. I approve." Murphy said as she started to lead me in.

"The Blue Beetle's a classic." I had to defend my car. Sure, it wasn't exactly blue anymore and the upholstery had to be replaced recently (Mold demons, don't ask. Seriously), but it was _my_ car. "And Mike said it should be fixed by the end of the week anyway."

"Uh huh. If you say so, Dresden." We got to the door to the hotel, which thankfully was one of the ones you pull open rather than an automatic. To continue with our bit of banter, I pulled open the door for Murphy.

"Ladies first." My smile wouldn't melt butter as Murphy stepped through scowling. However, once we were both inside, she chose rather than shooting back, she'd get a head start on heading to the elevator. I, of course, was not long behind her. This reminded me eerily of one of my earlier cases. Murphy and I racing for the elevator only to lead to something worse. While I hoped that the murder scene up above wasn't going to be as bad, something told me that was just wishful thinking. Murphy was actually hiring me to work for SI for once, after all.

When we reached the elevator, simultaneously, I might add, Murphy turned to me after pressing the button. "Harry, this isn't going to be pretty."

"They never are, Karrin." They never are. It was the middle of December, so the method that Victor Sells had used… No, that was getting ahead of myself before I had even seen the bodies. Just because they were killed in a hotel did not mean that it was the exact same situation.

The elevator arrived, and we both stepped in, me a little more uneasy than Murphy. I never really liked the idea of being placed into a box that was being raised slowly, and ever since I crashed the elevator in my office building, I have been even more apprehensive about them. Still, Murphy pushed the number for the thirty-second floor, one lower than the penthouse. The elevator began to climb, and despite my apprehension, nothing seemed to be affecting it magically or otherwise.

Murphy and I waited for the elevator to reach its destination in a relatively comfortable silence. We'd known each other for a few years now, and I could tell that whatever had happened here had shaken her a little bit, throwing her off her game. I didn't like that. Not much these days could do that to my friend, but somehow this murder had. I guess I would have to see for myself, but I had to wonder if assuaging my curiosity would be worth it in the end.

The elevator dinged as we arrived at the floor, and the doors opened slowly. The hallway was crawling with officers from SI, most of whom I recognized and in return recognized me. Upon seeing me, some of them gave strained smiles, but they mostly just stepped aside and kept clear. Standing outside the crime scene hotel room was a familiar face with a bad haircut. His moustache was trimmed neatly for once, but his suit was a little unkempt.

"Hey Harry, Lieutenant," John Stallings greeted as we walked up. "You sure you want Harry in before CSI, Lieutenant? I mean, I know he's good, but it's still a crime scene… Nasty one at that."

"If I'm right, he might be better for us before Butters looks at the bodies." Murphy answered her partner. Stallings had been her partner since the death of her previous one, and he seemed to trust me a decent amount. He grimaced when looking at the room and nodded. I gave a cautious glance to his eyes and then down again as I headed to the door.

"Hope you've got a strong stomach, Harry. This isn't pretty." Stallings opened the door to the room, and I mentally prepared myself. During my time operating in Chicago, I'd seen many murders, but I don't believe that many of them had been in hotel rooms in high rise buildings. Stepping through the door, I had a guess as to what to expect. Blood would probably be on the walls, potentially signs of struggling against whatever did the killing, knocked over furniture, broken appliances, that sort of thing.

What I hadn't expected was the entryway to be so depressingly _normal_ , for a hotel suite anyway. The living area of the suite's couch had some messed up cushions, clothing strewn about. A pair of panties there, a button-down shirt there. I knew the rules, no touching. I wasn't going to contaminate the scene, but it was fairly obvious what had happened here. An open bottle of champagne sat on a table next to two occupied chairs. My eyes almost passed over the occupants of the chairs for a second before snapping back.

The bodies had been _posed_. His hand over hers on the table, her leg reaching under the table to caress his, but that wasn't what was wrong with the picture when I looked at them. No, what was wrong was how his left hand was paired with her right, and her left with his. In fact, as I turned to get a better look, somehow, both bodies had been split symmetrically and then placed such that the halves would line up. He'd been a brunette, slightly scarred and muscular. She… probably had been attractive. Her hair, the bit that was visible through the blood, had been shoulder-length and red. Each half was symmetrical, so I had no idea which side had been which original person. They had been joined right along the symmetry line.

Of course, this was by no means perfect, and judging from the blood pooled under each of the chairs, this posing and joining had been done not long after they had died. No signs of struggle in the living area, and there wasn't any blood spatter to support the death in there… I had to make my way to the bedroom. As I stepped inside, I nearly had to step back out again due to the smell. The bedroom was definitely the scene of the murders. The blood had reached the ceiling while the… other things had pooled on the bed and onto the carpet near it. I let my eyes take it all in before stepping back out to take a breath.

Murphy was at my side, and I carefully avoided looking toward the bodies. "There's no obvious murder weapon, not with that sort of cutting it would take to make that smooth a cut. The lack of struggle, even in there signifies that they either were alone of they knew their murderer. There's no sign of forced entry, nor have we been able to find anyone else in the footage entering this room. CSI will be gathering all the evidence they can in here, but I wanted to get your take on it."

I nodded and thought. "Well, while I've never heard about a Warlock doing it, that doesn't mean it's impossible for this to be thaumaturgy, but judging from how dry that blood over there is, these murders happened last night. I'm probably not going to get much if I use the Sight here since dawn has already came today. Do you know who they are yet?"

"Butters would have to confirm it for the man, but we did manage to get an ID for the girl, if you think that will help." Murphy said, keeping her eyes on my face, albeit not meeting my own for too long.

"Lay it on me." It couldn't hurt, at least. I had very little to go on here save for the method of presentation. A name could help because I could track down a motive.

"The woman is one Lisa Hendricks, formerly a college senior at UCLA. Harry, do you think that it's like… The Sells case?" Murphy asked, and while I didn't blame her for being suspicious of me then, she probably felt a bit guilty about that still.

"No storms to power it. I suppose if you had a powerful enough warlock, you could pull off something like this."

"Could you?" Murphy asked. Once upon a time, I'd probably be worried she was actually asking if I did it, but now it seemed much more like simple curiosity.

"I really don't know… Murphy, while I don't expect much, I think I should probably chance it." I stepped back over toward the bedroom and closed my eyes. Murphy followed behind, careful to keep behind me. She knew what I was going to do.

A Wizard's Sight is both a gift and a curse that all Wizards share. It allows us to see things for what they truly are, and it lets us perceive things that would not normally be visible to the human eye naturally such as spirits, magic, among other things. There is just one major drawback to using the Sight. Whatever a Wizard looks upon with his Sight is something that he will never be able to forget. The image will burn itself on his memory. I have a number of nightmarish things that I have looked upon with my Sight, and I have some good as well.

For this case, however, I needed a lead. If that meant adding a new nightmare to torment myself with, so be it. I opened my Sight to perceive the room.

Describing the Sight to someone who doesn't have it is difficult. Colors are brighter, definition is sharper, sounds are clearer, and smells and tastes hang on the nose and tongues for easier identification. The Sight is actually a bit of a misnomer that way. But as I looked into the room, I could almost see the divisions that happened. The man was sitting on the bed, and Lisa had been the one who was standing nearby. There were remnants, cords of some sort of spell. One black, one white, and both were heavily intertwined with each other as they reached out toward the places the people died. I bet if I followed the cords toward the living area, they would cut off before reaching the bodies, but only just. The spells were too degraded by the dawn to identify them, but they were there. I didn't want to test y theory for fear of what I might see.

I closed my Sight with a bit of effort and will. Then I turned to Murphy, "Yeah, they were definitely killed by magic, Murph. I can't tell exactly how unfortunately. Maybe if they'd been murdered after dawn, but the magic's too far gone to get a clear picture."

"You can figure it out, right? You did before." Murphy asked as I stood up to get a better look around the room. There might have been something mundane I missed. A picture sat face-down on the dresser.

"Probably. You get a look at the picture here?" I pointed it out. Murphy reached out with a gloved hand and carefully lifted it to flip over. Four person family, all redheads. One of them, a rather imposing young man stood next to who I assumed was the female victim out there. He seemed familiar, but I couldn't quite place him.

"Not really evidence, but useful." Murphy commented. "Maybe they'll be able to… Damnit."

"What?" Murphy saw something in the picture I didn't.

"Take a closer look at the son, and tell me what you see." I took a closer look, forcing myself to ignore all the blood around me. I could be professional too, when there was something to focus on. The son had slicked-back red hair, slightly spiked, a strong jawline, and he appeared to be scowling in the image. No. Combine that with the female victim's name.

"You're kidding me. The female victim… she's…"

"A Hendricks, and related to the one that both of us know." Cujo Hendricks, Gentleman Johnny Marcone's top enforcer was the son in this picture, and one of the victims was apparently related to him, possibly his sister. Combined with the method of death, this case just gets better and better.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

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Disclaimer: See full disclaimer on first chapter. I own nothing used here.

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After wrapping up at the crime scene, I told Murphy that I'd look into what I saw. It wasn't exactly something off-hand that I could tell, no matter how similar it had been on the surface to what Victor Sells had been doing all those years prior. It really was too bad my project was only half complete; this was something that it would be perfect for. I'd be able to trace the magic as it came, and I would be able to track it down to its source. As it stood, the project still required quite a bit of work, and a bit more materials and magical investment.

As I stepped outside the hotel, I must have been rather lost in thought as I managed to somehow bump into a gorgeous woman, practically tripping over her. Instinctively I positioned myself so that I hit the ground before her, allowing the pretty blonde to fall on top of me. Her gloved hands touched my chest, and I could see into her brown eyes when they locked on mine. I quickly looked away before getting drawn into a Soul Gaze, letting my eyes trace down the contours of her nose and ruby lips.

"S-sorry…" She said, pushing herself up off of me. "I-I-I was j-just trying to get into the hotel…"

I stood up quickly, straightening out my duster. "It's alright. The police are just wrapping up in there."

"Oh? W-what h-happened?" Wow, this girl was terminally shy, and the way her jacket hugged her body was... Hey, I'm a man. I can appreciate these things. She wore a tight red jacket paired with some appropriate pants for the weather.

I mulled over whether I should tell her what had happened, but I was beaten to it by John Stallings. "Pair of murders happened upstairs. Shouldn't really impact your stay too much, miss, but we're going to have to ask you to be careful."

"M-murder? N-not impact my stay?" The woman shook her head. "M-maybe I should change h-hotels."

It's hard to describe how cute her stutter made her. On most people, a stutter would become annoying quickly, but on her, it seemed to work. Still, I had somewhere I needed to be. "Evening miss, John."

John had probably come to wait on the CSI guys and direct them up to the scene. They probably wouldn't find more than I did, but the real interesting thing would be to go to the morgue later to see what could be made of it. I made a mental note to do that.

"W-wait…" I stopped and turned toward the woman. "Y-you're Harry Dresden, aren't you?"

I nodded. "I am, did you need a wizard, miss?"

"N-not exactly… I-I saw you on Larry Fowler. I w-wanted to be sure…" Ugh. Larry Fowler was still trying to make me pay for the damages to his studio from a few years ago. It hadn't been my fault, and there really wasn't anything I could do about it other than let my lawyer pick apart the case. Needless to say, I wouldn't be returning to the show. Ever.

"Not my best time, but if you ever need a Wizard, I'm in the phone book. My rates are pretty good too." I gave a genuine smile and let my eyes flick to hers for a second before moving back to her nose.

"Y-yes, I'll remember that. S-sorry…" She paused after her apology. "F-for bumping into you, I mean…"

"Don't worry about it… I'm glad you're okay." Another smile, and this one was even returned. I really did need to get going though, so I waved and started off again. As I walked off, I could see her turn to head into the hotel out of the corner of my eye, and I passed the CSI guys as they started in. I headed into the parking lot to get to the loaner Jeep, and put the duffel bag away.

I climbed into the driver's seat and started toward Saint Mary's. As I pulled out on the highway, I thought over the crime scene. There hadn't been any forced entry, and there hadn't been any struggle consistent with the kind of weapon that would cause… that. Perfectly bisecting someone required a few things without magic, and with magic it required different things. Sure, I could see it being done with thaumaturgy, but to pull that off in that manner? Victor Sells only made hearts explode out their chests. Hah, only.

"It always has intrigued me the lengths which you mortals will go through in order to murder one another, my host." A smooth, sultry feminine voice said from my passenger seat.

I didn't even have to look over at her to know what I'd see. Lasciel was an amazingly good looking blonde woman, practically a goddess of beauty. Today she wore a variation on a dress that I know I'd seen before, but I hadn't seen it look like _that_ on anyone. Of course, the major thing that would turn me off from this relationship was that she was the shade of a freaking Fallen Angel who tried to convince me to take up the Blackened Denarius where the real Lasciel was imprisoned.

"I really wish you wouldn't do that." I said to her as I kept my eyes on the road. "I may have mentioned this before."

"Using magic to bisect someone like that, splitting them along a line of symmetry. That would require great control and precision…"

"What are you doing?" I turned partially toward her so I could keep an eye on the road and see her face as she turned toward me.

"Isn't it obvious, my host? I am trying to help. The people were killed with magic, and since you will not take up the coin, I am attempting to help where I can." Lasciel smiled, and heaven help me, I could see why she would.

"I don't need your help with this right now. I have Bob, and I can work with him on that while I work on my project later." I wouldn't let myself be taken in by her words. If I started relying on her too much, it would lead to Bad Things later. I couldn't let that happen. "And if you're going to be hanging around in the car, please put on a seatbelt."

"What?" The shade seemed confused. "You know I'm not really…"

"Either go away, or put on a seatbelt. It isn't that hard." I focused on driving. "Having someone in the passenger seat without a seatbelt on these roads is distracting. Shoo, Lasciel; I'm sure you'll come tempt me later. Besides, we're headed to a church."

Sure enough, St. Mary of the Angels Catholic Church was just down the street. Its steeples kissed the sky and the numerous angel statues stood watchful on the roof. Lasciel's shadow looked toward the church and nodded. "I will return later, my host. After you have seen to whatever it is you need here."

And then she was gone, and I was alone in my car again. True, she was really just an illusion coming from within my head, but there was something about her being where I could see her rather than just being a voice that made her seem more real. She was dangerous, and I could never let myself forget that, lest I allow myself to give into temptation.

I parked the Jeep in the Church lot, and I made my way to the entrance. Forthill said to meet him at five, and it looked like Daily Mass was just now getting out. Standing out front in full vestments was Father Anthony Forthill, a kindly looking priest of slight build and medium stature. His hair had long since started to grey and his eyes were the color of robin's eggs. Wireframe glasses sat lightly on his nose, and today he wore a pair of white gloves, likely to combat the cold.

As I got close, I could tell when he saw me from his smile. He shook the hands of the last family out the door and started toward me. I met him halfway down the path, and nodded my own smile to him, adjusting the duffel bag and my staff to be out of the way so I could shake his hand.

"Harry, it's good to see you." Father Forthill greeted me.

"Same to you, Father. So, you said you needed my help?" After my question, he nodded quickly and looked around the area.

"Yes, but perhaps it's best we discuss this inside. Let me get changed, and I'll be able to discuss it with you." While that wasn't completely unreasonable, I did just drive over here from a crime scene and I had a limited amount of time before I had to pick up some Wardens to ensure they got to their hotel safely, so perhaps it could be understood why was impatient.

"I suppose, Father, but could you tell me anything before we go in? Something to help me prepare, perhaps? You mentioned this was about Shiro." I can be diplomatic if necessary. Truly, I can.

Forthill, for his part, was extremely patient with me. "I'll tell you all that I can inside, but what I can tell you out here is short. Shiro Yoshimo's grave has been robbed."

Oh. It was going to be one of _those_ days.

* * *

Shiro's grave had been robbed. _Shiro's grave had been robbed_. The man had sacrificed his life for my own, submitting himself to a curse that had been meant for me, and his grave had been robbed. There were no words for how angry this fact made me. When I found who robbed the grave, I would show them the error of their ways, and then I'd make sure that they were put in the darkest hole imaginable.

It wasn't until the door lamp shattered that I realized what I was doing. Wisps of sulfuric-smelling wood smoke came up from the carvings in my staff. I had been gathering power in _anger_ , and I hadn't had a real target for it. If Ebenezar could see me now, he'd probably thump me across the head. Some Wizard I was, letting my temper nearly get the best of me outside a church.

"I'd been meaning to replace that bulb." Father Forthill said as he opened the door from the inside, now dressed only in his casual outfit. "It had been needing it for a while."

I breathed in and out, letting the anger flow out of me. I would be no good to Forthill if I couldn't focus. I wouldn't be able to help find the robbers if I were furious.

"Sorry about that, Father." Usually I was decent around lightbulbs, at least for a bit, but no technology could really withstand being near active magic, not the way I had been channeling it anyway.

Forthill for his part simply nodded and stepped aside. "We'll talk in the study. I trust you remember where that is."

"I remember, Father." I had been to St. Mary's plenty of times before, though it had been several years since the last time. I hadn't been wanting to come down until I could figure out how to deal with the problem I'd developed since then. I still hadn't yet, but this was important.

The study in St Mary's rectory was a cozy affair. There were crucifixes hanging on the walls, and there was a small fireplace near a pair of chairs with a table between them. On one wall was a sizeable bookcase with several leather-bound books on them. Some obviously were books of prayer, while others were books on more mundane subjects.

The fireplace had a sizeable flame going when I entered, and I stood near it to wait for Forthill. The man entered a short while after me, carrying a file folder under his right arm. He closed the door after himself, and he gestured to the chairs.

"Please, Harry, take a seat." I did so, glancing at the folder in his hand. "As you probably remember, Shiro was buried back in Japan, allowing his family to have a proper funeral for him, and have the grave nearby."

I nodded. This made me wonder. "Why am I being contacted about the grave robbery then, and better yet, why were you?"

Father Forthill grimaced. "There were indications as to where the robbers would come next. From what was left at the gravesite, it seemed like Chicago was going to be their next destination."

There was only one reason I could think of that grave robbers would come to Chicago after robbing the grave of a former Knight of the Cross. "They're after the sword."

"That is what Father Watanabe fears, yes. The Japanese authorities have alerted the FBI to the entry of possible grave robbers to the United States, but I am not confident that they will find them." I admittedly wasn't either. I wished that Shiro had been buried in Chicago, so that I could examine the grave site in detail. Going through the Ways to end up over there was not something I had planned on doing.

"So, what do you have in that folder there?" I only had a limited time for here and now before I needed to go meet up with Ramirez, Yoshimo and the baby Wardens. I needed to get all of the information that Forthill had. Perhaps he'd even have a bit of whatever the robbers stole so I could track them down.

"Photographs of the mausoleum after the robbers were there." He opened the folder and laid it down on the table. Eight photographs were in the folder, and while they were nowhere near as good as a crime scene photographer would be able to get, they were detailed enough that I was able to spot a few things just from glancing at them.

"Whoever did this wanted it to be known that they broke in." I noted the way the dust and rubble had fallen inside the stone mausoleum. Shiro had apparently been buried in a family tomb that had been a Traditional Shinto mausoleum. The thing that identified Shiro's plot was a combination of his headstone and the cross on it. "They wanted it to be known they were after Shiro specifically as well. None of the other graves appear to have been touched."

"They weren't, according to Father Watanabe." Forthill confirmed my suspicions. I flipped through the photos, looking at the different angles. The door had been blasted inward judging from the damage to the door frame and where the hinges should have been. I couldn't tell how for certain, as I would have had to been there within hours of it happening if it were magic. Evocation certainly was big enough to be able to do that.

"Hmm, what's this?" There was something etched into the doorframe, but the camera didn't have a good angle on it. It looked like someone had intentionally carved something rather than damage induced by whatever forced the door open. "Is there a better angle on what's in the doorframe, Father?"

Forthill shook his head. "There isn't a better picture of it, I'm sorry." It almost looked like the carving could be of keys of some sort, but I couldn't be sure from the angle I of the photograph. My eyes weren't the greatest, but I didn't only have to use my eyes.

"May I take the photographs with me when I leave, Father?" It wouldn't hurt to have another set of… Well, Bob didn't have eyes exactly, but the spirit had better vision than my own when he needed it.

"Of course, Harry." Forthill answered. I flipped through the photographs some more. One focused on the grave's damage. They'd managed to get in to Shiro's body, and they'd pulled something off of it. I couldn't tell what from the photo, nor could I really tell how Father Watanabe had known that whoever had done the thieving was coming to Chicago next.

Then I saw the next photo. Whoever had broken in had left imprinted upon the mausoleum wall around Shiro's grave a very distinctive skyline. The Sears Tower jutted up over the broken grave, making it the centerpiece of the imprint. No doubt about it at this point, whoever had stolen from Shiro's grave had to have used magic, and they were coming here. I could only imagine the reason had to be to get at the sword.

"What did they take from his grave?" I had to ask. Clearly Shiro's body had been in the grave when Father Watanabe had taken the picture, but that didn't tell me what was taken.

"According to Father Watanabe, they took the hand that he used to wield the sword." The hand. They took his hand. Thinking about it, there might have been a sympathetic link between his hand and _Fidelacchius_ , given how long Shiro was its wielder, but that didn't mean that the hand would work to track it down. They took his hand. I didn't even want to think about why…

"So, my goal is to track them down… and retrieve the hand." Sounded simple enough. One more photograph, there was a glint of silver on the ground that caught my eye. "Father, that's probably just…"

"Father Watanabe did send me one more thing, Harry. It's in this bag here." Forthill laid a cloth bag on the table near the file, and I opened it, dumping its contents to the table. We both winced as we saw what came out of the bag, likely for different reasons.

The coin seemed silver at first upon catching the light and was small. Unlike the coin that dwelled in the cement under my basement, this coin had its faces clear, and no sigil carved into it save for what had been minted. Upon closer examination, the coin appeared to be bronze, not silver, but it was indeed a Roman coin. The face the coin showed as it came out of the bag had two.

"That's not a denarius." I commented. "It's not what the Nickelheads would leave for someone to find…"

"No, it's not. It's a different bit of currency. If I recall properly, it's called an _as_." Forthill commented as he picked up the coin and examined it closer.

"So, the robbers are of the Order of the Shiny _As_?" I made a joke in poor taste, and my Latin never was the greatest. The coin had be lying face up, and I know I recognized the minted faces on the coin. I just couldn't place a name.

Forthill handed me the coin with a chuckle. "If they are, they have gone unheard of until now. No, I do not know why they used a Janus-faced coin to identify themselves. But then, we don't know who they are."

"I might be able to use the coin to track them, if they're nearby." I offered.

Forthill nodded, placing the coin in the bag for me and tying it up. "I wish you luck, Harry. This isn't urgent priority, but Shiro's family…"

I nodded. I knew what it was like to need some closure. "I'll look into these people for certain, Father."

I didn't even discuss payment. Forthill was good for it, and he was a good friend. I'd probably do this one pro bono, assuming he didn't insist I get paid anyway. Still, what kind of group would use an _as_ as a calling card? Maybe it had something to do with that key engraving on the door… something to do with Janus? I'd have to talk with Bob when I got home to get some of his theories.

In the meantime, I had Wardens to go retrieve. I said my goodbyes to Father Forthill and headed for the train station. At least the Wardens had a couple good things they could observe me on. Sure, finding grave robbers and hunting down a magical killer weren't exactly walks in the park, but with five Wardens, we practically had a huge advantage. What was the worst that could happen?


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

* * *

Disclaimer: For full disclaimer, see first chapter. I still own nothing used here.

* * *

Union Station could easily be described as your typical train station. It had platforms, ticketing counters, people milling about, waiting to board and waiting for trains to come in. Being that this was Chicago, Union Station usually held a good amount of people, especially this time of year who wanted to travel for the holidays. The trains were usually on time, and barring foul weather, it looked like they would be consistent today.

I actually enjoy traveling by train. It's one of the few methods of normal transportation that doesn't get completely mucked up by magic due to how simple it is and the actual distance from the train's working mechanisms. I found it a lot more relaxing than walking through the Nevernever, and the only thing I had to worry about here was being able to fit everyone into my car. If the Beetle weren't still in the shop, that would have been a bit more of a worry, but the Loaner would easily fit all five of us plus whatever luggage Carlos, Yoshimo and the two young Wardens had on them.

Now, I had arrived at the station with about twenty minutes to spare, and I made my way inside, out of the freshly falling snow. Winter's grasp was slowly closing as the Solstice approached, and it could easily have started to affect the train schedules. I had some hope that it hadn't snowed enough to severely affect them yet. Of course, Union Station had decided to upgrade to the new electronic display screens, and of course the screens happened to fail right as I was looking at them to see when the train would come in.

Sometimes magic just wasn't worth it. Very rarely, but there were times where it wasn't. Lucky for me, the train I was waiting for pulled into the station right on time, and I waited on the platform, keeping an eye out for my charges.

Ramirez was easy enough to spot through the crowd. Warden Carlos Ramirez was my counterpart on the West Coast of the United States, leading all Warden activity from his home city of Los Angeles. The man's classically Spanish features and naturally tanned skin stood out against the sea of pale people. It was winter in Chicago, who got tanned then? Ramirez somehow managed to make the jeans and button-down work for him, and he didn't even look like he was all that huddled into the brown cloak he wore over his clothes for warmth. He wore much the same thing the last time I saw him, when we were helping out the Venatori last month. In his hands he carried a suitcase, upon which was a wrapped bundle. I was fairly certain I knew what was inside: his Warden blade.

Warden blades were made of a magical silver of some sort, and they had the unique ability to cut through enchantments of most sorts. That and the Grey Cloak are what Wardens used in the process of executing their duties to the White Council. They, and now we, were the enforcers of the White Council, hunting down those who would break the laws of magic, and executing them. Of course, some Wardens saw Warlocks, those who broke the laws, at every turn, and were in a hurry to stop them, hard. Having been one of those targets, I have to say that I feel for the kids. Perhaps it was for this reason that I hadn't yet gotten my own Warden blade, though I had the cloak and the paycheck.

Next to Ramirez was another familiar face, Warden Yuki Yoshimo, a visibly Asian girl, dressed in clothes far more appropriate for the weather than Ramirez, and far more practical. Next to them were two more people, staying close enough that I could identify them as being with them, but they were so bundled up I could only tell their genders were different from each other at this distance. Luckily, Carlos seemed to spot me, as a grin spread on his face and he walked toward me.

"Harry! It's good to see you, my friend. Sorry to barge in on you like this." His voice carried a slight accent and a hint of jovial attitude.

"Eh, it's not a problem, Ramirez. What else was I going to do, take some time off?" My own tone probably had a bit of bite to it which I was going to blame on the cold. It was hardly these Wardens' fault that they were assigned to come here. It certainly wasn't their fault that someone had gotten murdered with magic.

"Hey, what'd I say last time? It's Carlos. Any man who lets me ride his dinosaur has earned the right to use my first name." Sue was definitely an experience that Carlos had been a big part of this past Halloween. It had certainly been an eventful two months, and I haven't even been a Warden for all of them.

"Right, I'll remember next time." I nodded to Yoshimo as she made it up, also carrying a wrapped bundle which likely held her blade. "Warden Yoshimo, glad to see you again in a better state than last time."

Yoshimo gave a smile and a bow. "Warden Dresden, I am eager to perform our duties here."

I cocked my head at the other two. "You two, I don't know yet."

The man of the pair unfurled his scarf a bit, revealing a tanned complexion, if less tanned than Carlos's natural coloring.

"Howdy, Warden Dresden. I'm Bill Meyers, but mostly folks just call me Wild Bill." I could almost picture him with the cowboy hat and boots. He had to have a six-shooter to go with his Western drawl. "Nice to meet you. I'm based out of Dallas, so I'm under your jurisdiction."

The unknown woman of the pair unfurled her own scarf revealing a gorgeous face, with high cheekbones and captivating eyes. Now that I looked closer, her clothes looked to be mostly designer or designer knock-offs, but they remained practical.

"I know, I know, I should be a movie star, Warden Dresden. There's no need to stare." Her accent spoke of Southern California, as did her looks for that matter. "You can call me Warden Chase. People speak highly of you, so I'm looking forward to learning what you have to offer."

"Don't let her fool you, Harry. She's much more than a pretty face." Carlos offered. "But what a face. It is too bad that I do not mix business and pleasure, otherwise she and I, we'd be very close."

"Uh huh, right." I said, as I looked them over. Chase didn't have a sword bundle, but Meyers did. Did they not trust Chase the same way that they didn't trust me? Possible. Wonder what she did. I also wondered what her first name was, but that didn't matter as much. "So, where are you guys going to be staying? I'd offer my place, but the couch is taken at the moment."

"Captain Luccio put us up at the Hyatt…" Ramirez offered.

"Too bad you will have to cancel those reservations, I hear the Hyatt's pretty nice, Wardenssss." That… wasn't any of us. No, instead it was a nearby passenger pulling out a…

"GUN! Get down!" Shaking out my shield bracelet, I placed myself between the Warden contingent and the one I saw, and I raised my left hand and called out strongly, enunciating every syllable clearly. " _Defendarius!_ "

A focused blue semi-sphere of energy formed around me and spread to protect the Wardens. I probably could have made a full sphere with this shield bracelet, but it would have been smaller as this focus was new and mostly untested. It operated much on the same theory as my last shield bracelet, blocking kinetic energy and impacts, but it also would protect from other forms of energy as well. In this particular case, it was absorbing the energy of the bullets and letting them fall harmlessly to the ground in front as the passenger unleashed his semi-automatic magazine upon us.

I barely noticed that Ramirez, Chase and Yoshimo were also forming shields as more passengers pulled out machine-guns to fire upon us. The normal passengers, smartly, seemed to be fleeing from the scene en masse, leaving us a safe space to deal with our attackers in.

Once the firing stopped, the passengers began to change. Limbs lengthened, noses and mouths stretched, opening up to reveal sharpened teeth, and claws sharpened on their hands. Ghouls, the train had managed to get at least three of them onboard, and there were an additional four more that were waiting here at the station. For us. Wonderful.

"Grandma, what big teeth you have." I commented to the ghoul in front of me as it sneered. Grandma was such a fitting name. It swung uselessly against my shield, and I reached into my coat for my blasting rod. "Guys, I'm going to drop my shield in twenty seconds, be ready."

I mentally berated myself for leaving the staff in the car. There hadn't been an attack today at all, and why would I have expected there to be one on the Wardens as they got off their train? I was lucky that my blasting rod was far more inconspicuous.

Having heard the acknowledgement of my charges, I sidestepped slightly, getting ready so I could blast _away_ from the train.

"All right. Dropping shield _now_." I raised my rod and pointed at Grandma, its tip glowing red. " _Fuego!_ "

A gout of concentrated fire leaped from my rod to the ghoul's chest, igniting it on contact. It screamed in pain, and it slashed at me again, this time connecting with my coat. I had designed the runes on my coat to give a certain impacts, and dampen them, but it had more been to take bullets than knife or slashing impacts. It still took them and reduced the energy, but I knew that my arms would be bruised in the morning. I backed out of range as quickly as possible.

Carlos, Yoshimo and Myers had all unfurled their blades and began attacking ghouls in earnest. It was obvious that they'd been trained by blade masters, and it made me miss my own cane sword that I'd had at one point. Each of them had already taken down a ghoul each. Chase, on her part, was levitating some knives over each shoulder, and pointing at a ghoul, sending the blades flying every so often, and then having them come back once they'd stabbed something.

What disturbed me was that despite us taking down several of the ghouls in our initial volley, there were still at least five more that I could see. In addition, it looked like some of the people who should have been scared away by the gunfire stuck around.

"Oh, that's wonderful, Warden Dresden. The Reds have laid out a welcome carpet." Chase's voice held a note of acidity as she threw another knife with her magic. She wasn't wrong though. The ten people remaining all had dark, iris-less eyes, no longer needing to hide what they were with the civilians gone. They were vampires of the Red Court, and they looked hungry.

"We'll just have to show them the welcome wagon instead, Warden Chase! _Pyrofuego_!" I laid out a bar of fire as wide as I could safely make it and managed to get another hit on the ghoul in front of me. My flames kept going, striking the ghoul behind him, and engulfing her arm. The flames kept going, and the vampire at the end leaped out of the way, leaving its skin behind.

If you haven't seen a Red Court vampire out of its skin before, trust me, you're one of the lucky ones. In its natural form, Red Court vampires are this slimy bat-like monster with claws, dark eyes, and what looks like the barest bit of wings. They have this pouch in their stomach where the blood they drink pools as they digest it. Cutting that open or beheading them are the two easiest ways to deal with them. Me, I usually prefer some sort of fire.

Upon losing its flesh mask, the vampire screamed out in a high pitched squeal, echoed by the other vampires in the station. Then, in unison, the others dropped out of their own flesh masks, and they charged us.

"Now Yoshimo!" Ramirez yelled, and Yoshimo cast the spell she had been preparing. Now, I like to consider myself somewhat skilled with wind. It's my second favorite element to use after fire, after all, and I am able to do some modestly impressive things with it. Yoshimo, though? Yoshimo made the wind _dance_. The wind picked up within the station, increasing to a gale force, directed by Yoshimo's wand focus. It slammed into half of the oncoming vampires, knocking them off their feet and claws, throwing them hurtling through the air and onto the train tracks.

If you've ever heard the expression or warning "Don't touch the third rail," there's a reason for it, one which the vampires that Yoshimo threw onto the tracks found out the hard way. The third rail of a train track gives electrical power to the trains as they pass by, and if something conductive were to touch it, it would receive a nasty jolt, strong enough to kill if held long enough. Buffeted by Yoshimo's winds, the vampires couldn't get off the track before it fried them.

Ramirez took advantage of the distraction, snapping his gauntleted fingers, unleashing some sort of spell that tripped a group of oncoming vampires as he moved with his sword. A flash of silver had him beheading the ghoul he tangled with and another disemboweled a vampire. Myers stood back-to-back with Chase, each using their blades to keep the vampires and ghouls back while every so often, Myers would unleash a fire spell, less focused than my own, of course. Chase, for her part, seemed to be able to put the knives where they needed to go, but she didn't seem to use anything other than the telekinesis that I could tell on first glance.

Of course, I had my own enemies to deal with. While I refrained from using Hellfire, I continued my assault upon the vampire and ghoul contingent, alternating between castings of Fuego and Pyrofuego to ensure that they were contained. I occasionally had to block with my shield, but for the most part, the vampires seemed to just be trying to overwhelm us with numbers. Unfortunately for them, they couldn't get us completely surrounded here, and their lack of tactics let us get the bulk of them gone fairly quickly.

I blocked what had to be the last charging vampire with my shield bracelet.

"This just isn't your lucky day, ugly." I remarked, and we both looked to where my blasting rod pointed. It barely grazed the vampire's exposed stomach pouch, red light gleaming, and the runes on it starting to smoke slightly.

"Wizard, I will have your head!" Oh, ugly could speak! Too bad it didn't say anything useful.

"Sorry, too attached to it. _Fuego!_ " My fire burned through the blood pouch in the stomach, and it spread throughout the vampire, igniting it like oil. I pushed the body off of me and surveyed the station. Ugly must have been the last vampire, as I couldn't quite see any around. I saw a lot of damage though, the sprinklers were going to control the flames that were left as collateral damage, some luggage was out of place from Yoshimo's wind, and there certainly was a lot of vampire goo and ectoplasm from the ghoul and vampire corpses. Yes, the fight truly seemed like it was over.

A shotgun blast rang out from behind me, followed by the sickening slimy thud of another vampire falling to the ground. I turned toward the source of the blast and grimaced. I hadn't wanted to deal with the holder of that shotgun today, nor had I wanted to deal with any of his people.

"Hello, Mr. Dresden." A businesslike smile came to the man's face as he handed the shotgun to the blonde woman on his left. "I do believe we have much to discuss."

Warden Chase quietly whispered to me. "Who is that?"

I answered her, just as quiet, "Johnny Marcone."

* * *

"Gentleman" Johnny Marcone was someone whom I'd crossed paths with a number of times while I've been here in Chicago. He's _the_ major player when it comes to crime in Chicago, and if any sort of organized crime happens in the city, he knows about it. Today his salt and pepper hair was lightly dusted with snow, and his green eyes held a seriousness that was almost chilling. His face still held the sun-hardened smile-lines, made all the more visible as he smiled.

To his left was Miss Gard, of Monoc Securities. The Amazonian woman's blonde hair was pulled back into a bun, and she calmly shouldered both the shotgun Marcone had used and a massive axe. I'd seen Gard wield that axe once before, when she saved me from a ghoul, a few months ago. She hadn't used it then, but she'd had it.

"Evening John, Miss Gard. What has you down on this side of the tracks?" That was odd. Marcone rarely went anywhere without his right-hand man, Hendricks, yet the redheaded man was nowhere to be seen. How unlike him. Marcone didn't look any worse for the wear, and without Hendricks there, and Gard seemed to pick up the slack a bit. "Get bored with all the crime and want to go do some traveling?"

"Business, I'm afraid, Mr. Dresden." Marcone managed to pull that genuinely apologetic tone fairly well, but it didn't reach his eyes, and he met mine. I'd soul-gazed the man years before, and what I saw still haunted me to this day. Marcone was _dangerous_ , but he was principled. "Ultimately, that business involves you."

While I could guess why, I wasn't going to make it easy for the man. "Oh, how so? And where's Cujo? Usually by now, he's giving me dumb looks and trying to be ineffectively threatening. He decide to finally leave your employ and go legit?" Hendricks could beat me like a drum, I was fairly certain, but I regularly mouth off to things that can do that. It's a bad habit. "I mean, I know he's not the smartest tack out there, but he at least tends to be consistent."

"The location of Mr. Hendricks and the business involving you are intertwined." Marcone looked past me toward Ramirez and the other Wardens. "Wardens, Miss Gard will accompany you to your car, which will take you to your hotel."

Ramirez looked to me in a questioning manner, and I blew out a sigh. I was the ranking Warden here, so it was my say whether they should take the offer or not, and while I didn't trust Marcone further than I could throw him, I knew the man. If he'd wanted to kill us, he'd have done it in a way that couldn't be traced back to him.

"Go on, Carlos. You have my home phone number and my office phone. If I don't pick up at home, call the office and leave a message. I'll be sure to check it if I don't hear from you within a couple hours." I know they were supposed to learn from me, but there are things that I do in Chicago that I don't want to have the Council knowing about. How I handle Marcone beyond what they saw is one of them.

"Right, Harry. If you're sure." Carlos said warily, patting my shoulder.

"John's as mortal as they come, Carlos. Don't worry about it. He's just shy about talking in front of strangers. Go with the pretty lady with the big gun." I nodded to Gard as she walked over. The other Wardens seemed to follow Ramirez's lead, and he made his way after Gard when she started to head out of the station.

"Now, if you are quite done, then, Mr. Dresden, we can go to business." Marcone said, clasping his hands in front of his waist. "Mr. Hendricks is currently at the morgue… identifying his younger sister."

Hell's bells, I knew that was going to come up at some point, but I didn't expect it to be that quick.

"I see that you are familiar with the case then. I suspect the good Lieutenant Murphy gave you a call this morning to bring you in." Marcone's voice never wavered. He was talking about this like one would talk about the weather or sports.

"Yes, and you know I can't talk about my cases, John. What do you want?" I tried to keep the irritation out of my voice, honest, but Marcone rarely talked to me without wanting something. Of course, to be fair, he and I didn't exactly run in the same social circles.

"It is simple, really, Dresden. I want you to drop your investigation." Marcone made his first offer. Given that one of the murders was the sister of Cujo, and I knew how Marcone liked his people, I could guess what he would much rather have done with those responsible. "I would even pay you for the lost business, but we both know you aren't going to accept that offer."

"Damn straight. I didn't stop before, and I won't stop now." I didn't even have to think about that one. I was hired by Murphy to do a job, and I was going to do it to the best of my ability.

"Of course not. Especially with four Wardens in town, five if we count you, Dresden." The man looked me right in the eye, unflinching. "Which is why I would prefer you leave the perpetrators to me. The Council will get their justice from them, and I will get mine."

Given how obvious it was that Lisa Hendricks had died from the use of magic, there was no question as to what the fate of those responsible for the deaths of her and her beau would be. They had broken the laws of magic, and the one thing I hated dealing with as a Warden was something I'd only had to deal with once so far. Those who break the Laws of Magic are to be killed, with very few exceptions. Whoever committed this murder was dead if we caught them and reported it in, they were dead if Marcone got them, so what was the difference?

Marcone's dollar-colored eyes reminded me what the difference was. Swiftness. The warlock or warlocks would suffer a swift death under the Council's justice. Marcone's justice would have them made into examples. I can't say that I didn't understand the need. I'd recently in the past few years found out that I too had a brother, Thomas, and if something had happened to him, I'd be wanting desperately to make whoever caused it to pay. I could only imagine what Hendricks must have been going through with his sister in the state she was in. Still, I couldn't in good conscience hand someone over to Marcone, even if they were a murderous warlock.

"Like hell. John, I'm not turning anyone over to you so you can work them over. When those responsible are caught, I will turn them over to the appropriate authorities." Marcone was not going to get that from me. Of course, given that he had Gard and Monoc Securities working with him, it was entirely possible that he had alternate means of investigation.

"I suspected as much, Mr. Dresden. Then my business with you must turn into a simple warning." Marcone's voice hardened, "I _will_ find those responsible and ensure justice is dealt."

"Not if I find them first." I commented and turned to go do just that. "Always a pleasure, _John_." I know it irritates Marcone to no end when I use his first name, which is why I do it. However, I couldn't help but wonder why he didn't seem as irritated today about it.

No matter, I ignored Gard on my way out to the Loaner. I got into the Jeep, turned the ignition and buckled up. I needed to head home. I had a skull to talk to.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

* * *

Disclaimer: See the first chapter for the full disclaimer. I own nothing used here.

* * *

It hadn't taken me long to get home from Union Station. I undid the wards to my house and gave my door a hard shove. I'd had a security door installed a few years back to prevent a number of things from just trying to break into my apartment. It was made of steel, so it had been very strong and sturdy, holding up to a number of attacks. This past October, it had met its match. It turned out that even a steel security door was vulnerable to a mass attack of zombies. Who knew? My brother and I had attempted to fix it ourselves, but neither of us was especially good with construction tools.

I gave the door another hard shove with my shoulder, and it opened. I was quickly greeted by thirty pounds of feline might slamming into my shins. My cat stepped outside for a second, looked around at the snow on the ground, and immediately turned back inside in an imperious manner. It seemed that the cold was a little much for Mister, which was fine for me. I stepped inside after my cat, and waited for Mouse to come out and greet me, the way he usually did when I got home.

Usually, it wouldn't take too long for my dog to come out and lick my hand, but Mouse took a little longer than usual. I stepped further into my freshly cleaned apartment, lit the relatively new candles with a muttered spell, and looked around for him. My dog was nowhere to be found, but there was a note on the table.

 _Harry,_

 _Took Mouse out for a walk around the park. I'll bring home some Chinese food._

 _-Thomas_

Ah, that made sense. With Thomas bringing back food, I didn't need to worry about fixing anything for myself. Judging from how clean the place was, I'd have to give Pizza Express a call to check my standing order. My little helpers needed to be happy, after all. I would make sure to call when I was done with my lab work, and before I met up with the Wardens. I'd have to fish out the grey cloak to bring along with me when we confronted who was responsible for this, but until then, I was in the clear.

I trudged over to the clumsily trimmed area of carpet that covered the trapdoor that was set into my apartment's floor. I hadn't exactly had the best of artistic ability when it came to trimming carpet for that sort of thing, even before my hand got burned. I pulled open the trapdoor onto a wooden stepladder that folded out and led down into my laboratory.

A few points of reference. My apartment is in the basement of the boarding house, and my lab is in the subbasement, which honestly is a much more elegant word to say than the basement-basement. It's not really much more than a large concrete box with a ladder leading up and out of it. The walls are lined with white wire shelving, the cheap kind you can get at Wal-Mart. Wizarding rarely pays all that well, and I make enough to get by. The shelves in my lab are used to store containers of pretty much every kind, from microwave-safe containers, wooden boxes, plastic dinnerware, plastic zipper bags, and I even have a lead-sealed box where I keep some depleted uranium dust that I use for some ghost hunting. Other shelves contain books, notebooks, envelopes, paper bags, pencils, many different random objects all fight for space on my shelves. The only shelf that remains uncrowded is a lone plain, homemade wooden shelf, which at the time held only candles at either end, three romance novels, the Sports Illustrated Bikini edition, and a bleached human skull.

A long table ran down the middle of the room, leaving a space on the other side clear of any other clutter. Inlaid in the floor was a plain silver ring, my summoning circle. Underneath that, was a foot and a half or so of concrete, beneath which laid another heavy metal box which was wrapped in its own little circle, surrounded by wards and spells. Inside the box was a blackened silver coin, a denarius.

Lasciel's Shadow had appeared to me earlier this evening, after the crime scene. She hadn't even really been trying to get me to take on the coin, not directly anyway, but instead she seemed like she had been trying to help. Would accepting the help of the shadow to puzzle things out really have been so bad? The palm of my left hand, the one that had been so badly burned save for a patch of skin in the shape of Lasciel's angelic symbol, began to itch. Yes, accepting the offer for help would lead to more reliance, which would in turn lead to more manipulation, and eventually I'd pick up that coin. I rubbed the hand against my leg and ignored the itch.

My worktable, at one point, had been crowded with material. Honestly it had been that way for most of the time I had the lab. Ultimately, that was no longer the case. I had begun a project that had eaten up much of my time and funds lately, including most of the funds that I managed to get from the Wardens. It was nowhere near done, and in fact was barely out of the planning stages, but when it was finished, it would be my most complex piece of wizardry yet. Unfortunately, that wasn't what I was down here to do just yet.

"Bob," I said. "Wake up, lazybones."

Reddish-orange flames slowly burned into brightness within the open eye sockets of the skull on the shelf. "Oh, going for the skeletal cracks this early, Harry?" A voice came from within the skull. "So, is it time to work on your model?"

I shook my head. "Not tonight… Well, at least not right now, tonight. I've got a couple cases, and I've got to show a group of Wardens how I do things."

"I thought that mess had been cleared up years ago, Harry, and aren't you a Warden now? Are they going to make you arrest yourself?" Bob asked.

"Not in that way…" I ground out, pausing for emphasis. "I get to show them how I solve a case, hunt down a black magic user. After that event with the Shoggoth, Captain Luccio felt that I was a good choice for this sort of thing. Plus the two cases, one of which is definitely black magic."

"Oh, do tell," Bob sounded genuinely curious. "What sort of case would this be?"

I explained to Bob about the murders at the Sheraton, how the bodies had been prepared for us, and what I'd seen with my Sight. There hadn't been any prints other than that of the victims, how the bodies had been perfectly bisected, and the fact that it was winter meant that there weren't any summer storms to power the thaumaturgy.

"Hmm." Bob said. "It's a real stumper there. Murphy was right to think back to Victor Sells and his methods, but the weather hasn't been very conducive to that sort of work lately. Thaumaturgy definitely is the culprit, but the power had to have been generated in another way. The method of death is telling too."

"How so?" I asked, wanting Bob to continue on his train of thought.

"Come now, boss, even you know that if the point was just the death, they'd just be dead. There was a reason that they were cut in half and reassembled." Bob said, clearly annoyed.

"Yeah, I thought that too, but I couldn't figure out why, other than perhaps to send a message." I shook my head. "But then, the only person who would get that message would be Marcone, and there were probably any number of better targets than Hendricks's sister."

"And the two half thing doesn't make sense with a Marcone target." Bob said. "Maybe we're looking at this the wrong way."

Something didn't quite make sense here. See, Bob was a spirit of air and knowledge who lived within the skull, which protected him and sheltered him. In exchange for that shelter and protection, he had to listen to whoever the current owner of the skull was, provide them guidance and access to his knowledge. There was very little that Bob didn't know about magic. I couldn't believe that he would be stalling here.

"Bob," I said, a bit annoyed. "Quit trying to make me figure it out and tell me already. How did our guy manage to kill the two of them from wherever he was to there?"

"Harry, if I do all the work, you'll never learn." Bob said, matter-of-factly.

"Bob, you know the answer. Tell me." I asked. "And no, you're not getting a ride-along with me or Mister right now because it's too cold for him outside."

"Fine. I still want out and the new Victoria's Secret catalog. I've heard that the Christmas offerings are delightful." Bob said.

"I'll get you the Victoria's Secret and two romance novels. This is the wrong time of year for you to go out." I said. Winter wasn't even in full force yet, and there was ten inches on the ground, almost as if it wanted to choke the remaining bit of summer out early, before the Solstice.

"I'll be careful." Bob whined out. "I haven't been out in _ages_."

I grit my teeth. Bob could be stubborn when he wanted to be, and while I could just order him to tell me, I tried to limit the amount of direct orders I gave the spirit. After all, Bob was one of my oldest friends, and I couldn't just order him to do everything I wished. It wouldn't be right.

"Fine," I relented. "But only until an hour before sunrise. And I better not hear of any orgies at any fraternities or sororities."

"Of course, sahib. It will be as you say." Bob said, almost too quickly, but my focus was on what I needed to know.

"Bob, the magic, how was it done?" I asked.

"Oh, it's rather obvious that it's a ritual. Invoking the power of some deity for some reason. The specific method of death isn't really typical to any one deity for how they would kill, though. It is, however, similar to a favored sacrifice to a Roman deity. In fact, I wonder if the magic you saw in there was the murder weapon, or if it was the connection to a greater ritual."

"Greater ritual… Which deity is that?"

"The Roman god of doorways, of beginnings and endings, of transitions. Janus. The symmetry, and the opposites are what Janus likes in his sacrifices, but he didn't usually like human sacrifice." Bob said. "But sometimes rituals require more power, and thus require more in exchange."

Janus… My mind flashed to the golden coin in my duster's pocket. Father Forthill had known a bit about the god, and a group that used coins with his face as a calling card were on the way to Chicago. Now another group was killing people, possibly to sacrifice for a ritual which I had no idea of what it could do.

"Bob, what sorts of rituals do you know from Janus?" I asked.

"Not many. My previous owners were less concerned with ritual matters and more concerned with expanding their knowledge and ability with magic without relying on an outside source." Bob said.

I nodded. I was more or less the same way. Ritual magic was potentially nasty stuff, especially if the casters found something from a source that hadn't been done often or by enough people. The less people who had attempted it before, the more potent it would be.

"But, if I had to guess, I would say any rituals about giving birth or having good trade are right out. No, if the ritual requires human sacrifice, then something big is going to happen."

"And given that Janus is the god of doorways…" I started, thinking it over.

"He is also the god of gates and passages." Bob gave a half-nod, which was more just a bob of the skull.

"Surely they're not going to try and…" I couldn't even finish that thought out loud. There was no way a bunch of cultists were that stupid. There was no way any ritual would contain instructions on how to do that. _Except those women did and nearly killed you and Thomas._ That ritual had simply reached beyond the Outer Gates. It had pulled the Outsider from beyond them, breaching the gates. Actually opening the gates? No, they couldn't be trying to open the Outer Gates. Rituals didn't have that kind of power, even at their worst, did they?

* * *

Let me get a few things straight about magic. Magic isn't just some power that can be called up on a whim to do your bidding. It is so much more than just that. My mentor, Ebenezar, taught me primarily that magic is life itself. Magic comes from life, from the living, from the very desire to _be alive_ , and anything that messes with that sort of principle is just wrong. The laws of magic that the White Council uses tend to stem from that.

The big one, of course is to not use magic to kill someone. It's why I carry my pistol. We're not supposed to use our power to, directly or indirectly harm someone save in the direst case of self-defense. This doesn't technically get applied when dealing with most nonhuman creatures, something I am very appreciative of. The second law involves transforming others. Basically Polymorph Other in roleplaying terms. Don't do it, it's bad and it can really mess someone up in the head. This also leads into the Third and Fourth Laws, which involves doing magical mind control. It's unpleasant. The Third more leads into the Fourth in that the Third involves actually invading the mind, while the Fourth enslaves it. The Fifth Law is basically No Necromancy. What it really means, in the eyes of the Council, at least, is no necromancy on human subjects, which tend to be the standard subjects that necromancers use anyway. I much prefer Sue and her crushing jaws myself, but again, only in the direst of circumstances. The Sixth Law is against time travel. Don't mess with the flow of time or create paradoxes. Bad juju.

The Seventh Law, of course, is far more relevant to this case, or at least where this case might be going. _Thou shall not reach beyond the Outer Gates_. Normally, this means do not contact Outsiders, do not help Outsiders, do not even research Outsiders. Naturally, this also means that there are issues with dealing with Outsiders if they become a problem. Magic doesn't work on them properly, or so I've been told. I've only had encounters with one specific one, and the form it took burned just fine the first time. The second, it never had opportunity to form. The ritual found by Thomas's father and used by the three ex-wives of Arturo Genosa merely used a spiritual form for it. They created a channel for it to use to travel through the Outer Gates. If the Janus ritual had the ability to do anything like that or more, I needed to find it and shut it down.

"Harry!" Bob's voice cut through my musings. "Are you alright?"

"Fine, Bob. Just thinking." Rituals… I made mental notes on where I needed to go. Maybe I could send one of the younger Wardens to Bock Ordered Books. I know Bock wouldn't want _me_ back there, but there might have been something about Roman deities there. I'd give Bock a call in the morning to ask about it.

"Well, boss, if you don't need me anymore, I'd like your permission…" Bob sounded eager. I really didn't want to know what he had planned.

"Fine! I give you permission to leave for the evening, but make sure you're back an hour before sunrise. And if I hear about any orgies, I'm tearing up that magazine." I threatened menacingly.

"Jawohl, sahib." I swear Bob gave a mocking tip of his skull before the lights in his eyes started to pour out. Bob isn't really a talking skull. He's really a spirit of Air and Intellect, one of the best tools a (comparatively) young Wizard like me can have, and he's also one of my best friends. Despite everything, I don't mind him going out every once in a while, and he does deserve this. His orangish-yellow glow coalesced into a single ball of light. "Don't worry, Harry. I'll be back…"

Bob shot off, out through the upper floor and presumably out a window into the night sky. I steadfastly ignored the laugh and cry that I must have misheard as he headed out; Bob would do what he needed to. Instead, I turned my attention toward the model and I prepared to do some fixing, but the phone started ringing before I even got the chance to get started.

With a forlorn glance, I headed up the ladder, out of my lab, and I got the phone.

"This is Dresden." Given that I was on a case, had Wardens to worry about, and Father Forthill was counting on me, I needed to be at least a little professional. I could do that, despite what Murphy might have thought.

"Oh good, Harry. You're there. I was afraid that… It doesn't matter, you're there." The voice on the other side brought a smile to my face. Waldo Butters was a friend of mine who works at the Medical Examiner's office. He was clued in, and he was very good at his job, often going above and beyond the realm of duty. He'd been a big help last October, and I was glad that he was going to be involved here.

"Butters, relax. Is everything alright?" Butters had also been attacked last October, and I didn't want to not be there for him if it were to happen again.

"Oh, I'm fine. These bodies though.. Lieutenant Murphy got them assigned to me, since it was an SI case. It's just… It'd probably be better if you came down here yourself to take a look. I've spotted a few things, and I can't really point them out over the phone." This happened occasionally. Assuming I wasn't persona non grata at the morgue, it really wouldn't be an issue. Given the time, Butters's boss probably wouldn't be there or would be on the way out, and I might be able to get the Wardens in. I'd have to warn Butters ahead of time though.

"Butters, I can come on down. Would you mind if I brought in some additional consultants? I'm helping with some training, and this would show them another side. Plus, I could use a second opinion on a few things."

"More? Uh, yes, I think it would be fine. There's room, I suppose. I'll have to turn off a couple computers, won't I?" Butters asked.

"Yeah. You've met two of them already, actually. You probably remember Yoshimo and Ramirez. It's them and two more." I said. "Probably best to keep the computers off and unplugged."

I could hear Butters grimace. "All right. See you… An hour? If that's good for you, I mean."

"Yeah, that should be plenty of time." My stomach growled in protest, but I soldiered on. "Just need to make a few calls before I head on my way."

"See you then, Harry." Butters hung up, and I did the same.

I called my answer service and obtained the number for where the Wardens were staying, room number and all. After that, I called their room, got Ramirez and told him where he needed to go. Luccio had put them up in a suite. Lucky them. Too bad that half of the electronics would be on the fritz after they left, but that's life as a Wizard.

All of forty-five minutes later, I was driving up to what normal people would call the morgue. Of course, in Chicago, you can't really call it that anymore. It's the Forensic Institute now. It's not run by a coroner but a medical examiner. The Forensic Institute is on West Harrison Street, which itself is inside a pretty amazing industrial park that mostly specializes in biotech industries. In the winter air, it was still pretty. It had wide lawns covered in sheets of freshly fallen snow, sculpted trees and bushes with a heavier powder causing some of those branches to bow down lower than they were designed. It's got an amazing view of the Chicago Skyline and a very quick access to the freeway.

Despite everything nice about it, it remains quiet. It's still a place where the dead are brought, a place where a friend of mine had died last Halloween, and it's still a place where I needed to go at this time of night.

I pulled the Loaner into the visitor's parking lot of the complex next door. Habits are hard to break, and though I wasn't using my car for this trip, I didn't want anyone figuring out I was here, even if Butters managed to get me on the visitor's list. Because of this, I managed to walk up just as the cab driving the other Wardens pulled into the actual visitor lot for the Forensic Institute and started letting them out.

I waved to Ramirez when I saw him step out, and I got lockstep with him. "Looks like you found the place alright."

"This is all nice and fancy, Harry, but I'm pretty sure that the ladies wouldn't want to be here." Ramirez said.

"Ooh, Warden Ramirez, you take me to the nicest places." Warden Chase's voice nearly made me jump if not for the sarcastic bite to it. "I'm just sure that this place is just full of oogieness."

I cocked an eyebrow. "Oogieness?"

"It's a word. Look it up." Warden Chase, I really needed to find out her first name, said bluntly. "Of course, we're supposed to deal with that sort of thing, so it's expected. Doesn't mean I like it."

I nodded. "I hope you never do."

Wardens Yoshimo and Meyers joined us as we headed inside. I checked in with the guard, Phil's replacement, and we actually were on the list for once. Well, I was, and my guests were allowed in as well.

"He's down this way." I led everyone down toward Exam room four, the only examination room with music coming out of it.

" _Oh dear, am I all out?"_ A wave of dizziness overcame me for a half a second, and I swear I wasn't in the morgue for a second. I was outside a house, but I couldn't for the life of me say where, but then I was back in the morgue.

"Hey, you okay, man?" Carlos asked.

"Just a lack of good sleep lately, Carlos." I waved it off and knocked on the door to the examination room. "Now, everyone, please be careful not to use any magic unless absolutely necessary in here. Butters is my friend, and he likes his electronics staying in one piece."

"Is that… polka?" Meyers asked, a little confusion dripping in.

"Butters is a bit of an afficianado." I knocked once more, and the music stopped. The morgue faded once more, and I was outside the house, standing with what looked like three pint-sized… somethings.

" _I could have sworn I had more candy."_ They were standing before an old woman with a Jack-o-Lantern bucket. She looked almost grandmotherly. I stood back behind them, just keeping an eye out.

Then I was back in the morgue as the door opened, my hand resting on the doorframe. Something wasn't right. What was going on? Magic was the obvious answer. "Anyone have some chalk with them? Anyone?"

Butters looked up at me. Waldo Butters was not a very large man, so I'm sure he looked up at a lot of people. His wild shock of black hair made it look like he was constantly surprised. Today he wore his blue medical examiner scrubs with fluffy brown bunny slippers, along with his wire-frame glasses.

"Harry, what do you need the chalk for?" Butters, who should have known this considering what I'd taught him last Halloween asked. Of course, considering he didn't know what was going on with me, Hell's Bells, I barely knew what was going on, but I needed to be in a circle, pronto.

"Circle, do you have some, Butters?" I asked as I headed into the examination room, followed by the Wardens. I must have looked rather frantic because the rest of the Wardens were silent as they did so. I'm not so sure who would be targeting me this instant, as I hadn't even really done anything lately other than fighting Red Court. Okay, the Reds could have been targeting me, but this didn't seem like their style.

"Yeah, top-right drawer of the desk." I hurried over to the desk, ignoring the bodies on the slabs, something that was painfully easy to do, and I retrieved the chalk. "Harry, aren't you going to introduce me?"

As I started drawing my circle, I nodded. "Sorry, right. Butters, these are Wardens Yoshimo, Ramirez, Meyers and Chase. You probably remember the first two from October. Guys, this is Waldo Butters, Medical Examiner extraordinaire."

I focused on the circle. Technically I didn't even really need to draw the circle, just focus on forming it mentally. The physical form had little to do with what was actually forming. A circle is about the simplest form of magic that anyone can do, and it will protect from most magic. I wanted to set one up around myself due to whatever was happening to me, and it should have worked.

Should have was the operative word, because the moment I tried to close the circle, I was again standing outside that house with those pint-sized monsters.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Monster… Maybe I ca-" The old woman got cut off as the green-skinned monster lunged at her throat. The red-skinned horned monster started to get in on it. Now that I looked closer, the other two there weren't monsters at all, but they were kids in costume. One dressed as a dentist, and the other dressed as a maid. Those two screamed and ran off the moment the monsters attacked.

"Hey!" I called out at the monsters, dashing forward. "Let go of her!" I brought my staff down on the hands of the monsters, using it as a form of leverage to separate the old woman from them. They yelped and started choking each other once I got them loose of the woman. She retreated into the house, slamming the door shut. I swear I heard it lock.

"Stop that!" I yelled at the monsters in my best authoritative Wizarding voice, but they didn't seem to be wanting to listen. Perhaps my tone was a little off, I didn't feel quite right, but I would separate them. _"Ventas! Ventas servitas!_ "

I called up some wind to separate the little monsters, who, upon separating, dashed out into the night. I breathed a small sigh of relief, but at the same time, I needed to figure out what was going on. The immediate danger had passed, so I took a look around. Clearly, I wasn't at the morgue anymore, and I had my staff, both of which things that should not be at the moment. I was outside a house, one with what looked like a balloon ghost face covering its porchlight, and there was a Jack-o-Lantern burning bright next to the door. It clearly wasn't snowing here, and in fact, the trees held green leaves. It was still night; the sun was down for certain, and everything just felt… off.

"Focus, Dresden." I told myself, and then frowned. That hadn't sounded right, nor had my spells for that matter. The world too, seemed larger, taller, or maybe I was shorter. I looked down at myself. I was wearing clothes similar to what I had been wearing earlier. My leather duster fit perfectly, I wore a tee shirt, and some jeans, but also some sneakers. Oh, and when I tipped my head down, my hair went into my face a bit, red hair. My red straight hair ended up in my face, as I peered down at my chest.

So, whoever did this spell had broken a few of the Laws, I supposed. What was one more in the grand scheme of things? I must confess, as a guy I had been curious, but I was a _guy_ , as a redhead on Halloween. I didn't know what the hell was going on, but I was going to find out and make them fix it. I also couldn't help but wonder about an implication. Did it really count if your birthday happened twice in the same year?


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter Five

* * *

Disclaimer: I own nothing used here. See the first chapter for the full disclaimer

* * *

Okay, let's take stock. Fact one. I was very obviously no longer in Chicago. Where I was, I hadn't been able to establish yet, but when I was… was a completely different story. Fact two. It was Halloween. Whatever magic that had been cast to bring me here was in blatant violation of the Sixth Law. Halloween had been a few months ago for me, involved lots of zombies, rotting flesh, and a ride on Sue the T-Rex, but it was quite obvious from the décor set up that today, or rather tonight was Halloween in this town. Fact three, perhaps the most important fact. I was no longer myself. I was no longer my own gender, and as much as I get teased about it by Murphy, I like being a man. I like being _the_ man. No matter, I couldn't change the situation at the moment, so I'd have to deal. Fact four, I had all of my magical implements. Inside my coat was my blasting rod, around my _ungloved_ left wrist was my old shield bracelet, in pristine condition even, on my right hand were my force rings, and in my right hand was my staff. I was loaded for bear, and everything _fit_ , as if it were sized for my new self. Weird, right? A glance toward my exposed hand's palm showed that it wasn't the disfigured blackened husk I'd become used to the past year, but instead it was a dainty feminine thing befitting the body I was in.

The first thing I needed to do was figure out where I was. It didn't _feel_ like I was in the Nevernever, but there were places within it that could easily be just as real as this. I didn't want to chance opening my own Way here, given that I didn't even know where I was. So instead I made my way out into the streets as chaos erupted around me. Child-sized monsters chased others, and older-sized beings made their way around the suburban sprawl that I'd found myself in. I could see cars in the streets, some moving, some stopped, and on some sidewalks, containers full of candy laid on their sides.

I wasn't going to chance opening my Sight here, but the more I walked around, the more tempted I was. Whatever was going on surely was the result of some thaumaturgical spell. It had to be in order to have an effect this great. It could even have been a ritual of some sort, probably calling upon some being of power to drag its influence down upon this townscape and reach across time and space to bring me here. But what I couldn't figure out was one simple question. Why? Why bother doing this? Bringing me here specifically? I couldn't figure if it had something to do with the case I was working or not, but it must have been likely. I'd have to figure it out once I got back to Chicago, or if I found out that wasn't possible.

"Help! Help me!" A girl's scream reached my ears, and I stirred into action, making my way past some parked cars, staff parallel to the ground. The girl screamed out again, and it wasn't long before I beheld her. I had to blink a couple times. The girl looked remarkably similar to Warden Chase, albeit at least a decade younger than the woman I met. She also was dressed in a spotted catgirl outfit, further cementing the date into my mind; nobody dressed like that on a day that wasn't Halloween. The thing she ran from appeared to be a remarkably smaller version of a loup-garou. I wasn't having any of that.

"Hey, Ugly! Pick on someone your own weight class!" I leveled my staff at it, and gathered some power. " _Ventas!_ _Ventas Servitas!_ "

I hooked the wind into the face of the beast, flipping it head over heel backward into the glass window of a nearby building. The paint on it clearly said "Magic Box," or well, it did before it shattered under the beast's mass. Smaller monsters scattered upon the impact, running to find easier targets.

"Get behind me, Miss Chase!" I called out to her, as I stepped toward the store front. If that thing had been anything like Harley MacFinn, that was barely a love tap to it. It was dark inside the store, and I couldn't clearly see, so I stilled myself and Listened.

Listening isn't really a form of magic so much as it is a form of concentration. I focused on what my ears were telling me directing my focus into the battered storefront and ignoring Miss Chase's mumblings. Inside the shop, I heard the beast coming to its feet, the glass crunching beneath its paws. I could hear its low growl, the creaking of the shop's floorboards as it adjusted its weight to its rear haunches in preparation for a leap. It was preparing for a surprise attack. Too bad for it. I tensed up my grip on my staff and raised my left hand, shaking out my shield bracelet.

"What are you doing, Rosenberg?" The cat dressed girl, Chase asked. Without anyone else around, she had to have been talking to me. I'd have to deal with that after mini-MacFinn did his thing. Timing was very important.

I heard the glass crunch and upon the beast's roar, I cried out, " _DEFENDARIUS!"_

My shield flickered to life in the form of a translucent silvered disc hovering between me and the micro-garou. My old bracelet's shield might not have the protection from heat and other energies, but it had enough for the kinetic energy coming my way. The beast slammed teeth and claws into the shield, its momentum pushing against it hard. Planting my feet, I took my staff into my left hand and used my shield to redirect the beast down onto the streetside, making sure to keep myself between Miss Chase and it. I felt my rings and grinned.

My silver force rings operated off of similar principles to my original copper one. Inside each ring was a rune array that allowed the storage of kinetic energy. Each time I moved my hand, my arm, or flexed it, a little bit of the kinetic energy generated from that movement would be stored within the ring. I could, at a time of my choosing, unleash all of the force stored within. All four of my rings were full.

When mini-MacFinn got to his feet and charged at me again, I dropped my shield and unleashed the brunt of a single ring onto it, blasting it backward into a lamp post. It let out a whimper and then dashed away.

"That's right, you better run." I called out after it before turning toward my unfortunate rescue. Miss Chase had addressed me by the name Rosenberg, like she knew me. I needed to know some more. Perhaps she might know something about what was going on.

"What the heck is going on here, Willow? First, everything's fine and we're taking the kids and then I'm running from Jojo the dog-faced boy! And you're rescuing me with big weird stuff. Something woogie is going on and I don't like it!" Willow. She'd addressed me as Willow now, after having addressed me as Rosenberg earlier. She thought I was someone named Willow Rosenberg. Wasn't that..? "With something this woogie going on, shouldn't Buffy be getting to work, finding something to, I don't know… slay?"

Hell's Bells. This girl thought I was Willow Rosenberg from _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_ , and I couldn't very well fault her for her assumption if I looked how I thought. Assuming she was telling the truth, and I had no reason to doubt that, given how she'd continued carrying on about the night as I was considering things, the girl probably wasn't lying. I needed to interrupt her so I could actually get some clarification.

"Stars and Stones, girl, are you going to just keep going on like that?" I paused. "Don't answer that one, please. I don't want to know how long you can keep that up. So, it seems like you think I'm someone I'm not. My name is Harry Dresden."

"Willow, what are you talking about?" She looked confused, so I decided I'd have to emphasize the point a bit more.

"I am not Willow Rosenberg. I am Harry Dresden." I locked eyes with her for a small moment, looking away as I felt the telltale pull of the Soulgaze. "But you are… Cordelia Chase, right?"

I was proud of myself that I could remember a character name from a TV Series that I'd only watched a few times. Elaine had been the fan of the series, not me, but I'd watched it with her on a couple of our outings while we were with Justin.

"Duh!" Cordelia answered. "Okay, so you're not Willow. You're Harry, and you can do woogie things. What's going on here?"

"I wish I could say. One moment I was in Chicago, and now I'm here… in Sunnyvale? No, Sunnydale. Magic's obviously involved, but I couldn't tell you much about it right now. What can you tell me about what you experienced?" I asked Cordelia, carefully avoiding the tear in her costume with my eyes.

"Well, one minute I was escorting those kids trick-or-treating like Snyder ordered me to. The next minute, they weren't kids anymore, and you saw Jojo who was chasing me. I think I also saw Larry Blaisdell dressed as a pirate, chasing some girl in a fancy dress." Cordelia paused, and I thought. That fit with what I saw glimpses of before I fully got here. The kids were lining up to trick-or-treat with that old woman, and then… chaos. They weren't kids anymore. The costumes had taken over.

"So the kids turned into their costumes then… and Willow did too." Was I even myself here? Or was I just the generation of some spell that affected Willow? Or was I possessing this body? I didn't feel like I was enacting a form of possession, but I wasn't entirely sure how that was supposed to feel from the possessor's end. "So I'm the costume Willow wore. Okay, that's fine. Why are you unaffected? I wonder... You definitely aren't a cat."

"No, I'm not." Cordelia sniffed and then looked down at her costume again. "Oh, damnit, why couldn't you have rescued me before Jojo the dog faced boy tore my costume? Partytown will never give me my deposit back now."

"It's not that big a tear…" I started to say, but a chilling roar cut me off. I turned toward the source, pulling out my blasting rod. Cordelia wisely decided to stand behind me, just as I'd placed her when dealing with the child loup-garou, and I looked toward where the roar had come from. "That's… not a good sound…"

What the roar came from could have been a grizzly bear, if the grizzly bear had managed to sprout an extra pair of legs between its normal two pairs. Or if the grizzly had managed to sprout a pair of ram's horns that wrap around the sides of its head. Perhaps it could have been a bear if the bear somehow managed to have an extra pair of eyes right over the second, one glowing orange, the other green. Of course, bears didn't typically have luminous runic tattoos swirling on their foreheads nor did they have two rows of serrated teeth coated with slime. No, the source of the roar wasn't a bear.

"Hell's Bells… It's Ursiel." I turned toward Cordelia. "Time to run."

* * *

In life there are a few immutable things that you just shouldn't do. Never get involved in a land war in Asia. Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line. A not too distant third is "Never let the enemy decide where you will be fighting." Ursiel had appeared out of nowhere, as most monsters are wont to do, and I knew what the Fallen had in him. If it weren't for the fact that I had a civilian with me, I might have tried to take him on right then and there. I needed a better venue to face the bear at. Stars and Stones, I hoped it was alone.

Ursiel, the bear-shaped monster, was a Fallen Angel, one of thirty trapped within a piece of Roman silver. A denarius. Yes, those pieces of silver. Yes, those Fallen. When someone, a mortal, picks up one of these coins, they allow the Fallen within to gain influence over them. Eventually, they become like what I saw within Ursiel in a soulgaze, trapped under the thumb of the angel, or they become like the leader of the group of coin bearers, the Order of the Blackened Denarius, Nicodemus Archleone. I'd picked up one of those coins; it was why I had the shade of Lasciel in my head, tempting me. I wouldn't give in to that.

As I ran down the streets of Sunnydale, I mostly followed the lead of Cordelia. Being unaffected by the spell, she at least seemed to have some idea where she was headed. Ursiel was not far behind us, gaining ground on the pair of us.

"Wizard… I can smell you." Ursiel's voice, contrary to the snarling roar it could let out was smooth, melodious and significantly unsettling. Its words crawled out of the bear's maw, gliding out over its teeth. "You may change your form, but we have unfinished business, you and I."

I urged Cordelia on faster, and we made it across an intersection in the street, child-sized monsters keeping distance from the big dangerous thing. They knew when the bigger predator was out and about. It wouldn't' be much further before I could give a good honest shot at taking down the Denarian. Doing nothing about its presence wasn't really an option, and while I didn't have a fancy sword of the Cross with me, I had something almost as good.

I looked around for things I could use. Above ground powerlines hung overhead, stringing between poles. Sure, they connected to the stoplights at the intersection, but that could be useful. Admittedly, electrical magic was never really my forte, but I had the beginnings of a wonderful plan starting to set in mind. If I used wind to sever the cables, I could wrap the charged ones around Ursiel, and then I could fry him with my most powerful fire spell. Wile E. Coyote. _Super_ genius. I wouldn't use Hellfire when casting though, not against a Denarian. Hellfire made spells significantly more powerful, granting the power boost when I needed it a few times in my past, but it seemed to me that using a Fallen provided ability _against_ a Fallen would be a bad idea.

Of course, I never got the chance to implement my plan as a black Chevrolet Impala slammed into Ursiel at a significant speed, knocking the Denarian onto its side. Orange and green eyes glowing brighter, Ursiel gave a heady glare at the Impala before turning its attention back to Cordelia and myself. I had stopped running because I had intended on enacting my plan. I had no idea why Cordelia had stopped running.

Ursiel let out a laugh. "So the vermin come out to play this eve, Wizard. We shall finish our business later."

I had already gathered my power, so when the Denarian turned to leave, I released it. " _Ventas! Ventas fulminos!_ "

Incorporating electricity into my wind spell was not the easiest thing in the world to do, but it helped that I had a perfect source right above the head of my target. Drawing wind down through the power cable, I severed it, creating a nice spark of electrical charge that traveled down my ionized wind toward Ursiel. It should not have been possible if not for magic for a creature that size to move that fast. The Fallen had managed to dodge the attack as it bounded off onto another nearby building from the street.

"I will find you again, Wizard… and we shall finish our business then." Ursiel's melodic voice sent a creeping chill down my spine. It wasn't afraid as it left, but it only left on a whim. With Cordelia nearby, I couldn't afford to take any chances with it. Once it was gone, I turned toward the Impala. Even before striking Ursiel, the car couldn't have been in good shape. The windows were painted black and the windshield was heavily tinted a similar color. Now, with a bear-shaped dent crushing the car half-up the engine block, there was no way that car was likely to drive again without some serious TLC.

The driver's side door opened. Whoever had driven the car was likely to be injured from how they'd struck the Denarian, and if they were mortal, there was no way they were going to be climbing out of that car on their own, even if they'd worn their safety belt. Of course, that meant whatever was on its way out of the car _wasn't_ mortal.

A black boot stepped down, followed by another, black men's pants, probably a shirt of some sort, and a dark leather trenchcoat. The man who wore it was decently tall, maybe just over six feet, but to me he looked giant, a stark reminder that I was _not_ in my own body. The man's skin was pale, as if he'd not seen much sun lately, and he looked to be just barely younger than I was normally. Given that he'd survived that crash with nary a scratch, either he was extremely lucky, or he wasn't human.

He actually smiled upon seeing Cordelia and I. "Cordelia, Willow, I'm glad the two of you are okay. Things are a bit crazy out here… Did I just hit a bear?"

I couldn't tell his game, but he obviously knew the two of us. Cordelia seemed to brighten up in his presence almost immediately. "Oh, Angel… you saved us!"

Cordelia was swooning over this guy. She swooned over this pasty-skinned, gelled hair, nonhuman guy who only hit the Denarian with his car. _I could have done that_. I saved us, had the perfect plan that was ruined by this guy's…

"Willow are you all right?" The man… Angel asked me, looking into my eyes with concern. Normally I would look away when confronted with someone else's eyes in this manner, but I was reasonably convinced that this Angel guy wasn't human. Normally with nonhumans, they lack the soul necessary for a soulgaze to commence. So I held the man's gaze, sure it would do nothing. Imagine my surprise.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter Six

* * *

Disclaimer: See first chapter for full disclaimer. I still own nothing.

* * *

So, what happens when a wizard looks into a person's eyes is that he, or she, at the moment, sees far more than just what color they happen to be. They say that eyes are windows to the soul. To a wizard, that happens to be quite a bit more literal. When I make eye contact with someone for too long, or even too intently, I get to peek in through those windows. Everything is laid bare before a wizard during a soulgaze. Nothing is hidden, on either side. You both see each other for what you are inside with such clarity that it etches itself into your head, unable to be forgotten.

No matter how badly you might wish to.

I felt a pulling, whirling sensation and fell upward into Angel's eyes, the dark brown consuming my sight for only a second. Before me was a stone wall that extended upward to a stone ceiling and to either side as far as I could see. Located on the wall was a single steel door with a window frame within it, in front of which was Angel. The man was trussed up, arms spread to either side of the door and chained into place, his chains driven into the wall. Unlike the confident man that stood outside, this Angel dressed in a tattered shirt and pants and was barefoot. His hair was unkempt and though he stood, it seemed more due to the chains holding him up than any actual effort exerted on his part. Tears streamed down his face, and he honestly just looked tired. He looked up to me as I approached.

"No, stay back!" At his outcry of that, something slammed against the door, hard. I looked through the door, and behind it stood Angel, only dressed in fancier clothing… and with a deformed face. The way the face scrunched up reminded me of a more human version of the bat-like true forms of Red Court vampires. Bony ridges protruded around its golden eyes, and it had a fanged grin as it slammed the door.

"Let me out! I'll rip out her throat and drain her dry!" Oh don't tell me that even in here I was Willow. Was there no justice? It didn't matter, so I stepped back, and I noticed them. They stood in a neat line to either side of the chained man, people of every age. Each person was pale white, and their clothing was stained with blood, especially around the neck area. There were a few others that I could see with worse injuries, but that didn't stop them from approaching Angel.

The first pair approached Angel and stood before him, a man and a young girl. When they did so, the door rattled again, and tears began anew on Angel's face.

"Why did you do it, Liam?" The man started. "How could you do it? How could you?"

"I'm sorry…" Angel mouthed, and in response, the demon laughed, describing an atrocity. The demon had drained the man and girl, Angel's own father and sister, and it got worse. Every person that approached accused Angel, and the demon behind reminded him of what had happened. Each and every time, and each time, Angel apologized.

It reminded me a bit of Thomas as Angel took responsibility for the actions his demon committed. Angel was not the demon, nor was my brother his Hunger, but neither could help what they were.

Then she came. Light shone down upon a blonde young woman, perhaps about Murphy's height, dressed in jeans and a leather jacket, as she pushed through the petitioners. Each one she stepped through turned to smoke upon contact. She approached Angel with a smile. She placed a hand upon the man's face, and the chains extended somewhat so he could touch her. A genuine smile touched his lips, and the pair kissed.

While this kiss didn't exactly top Westley and Buttercup's, I'd give it an eight out of ten from a voyeuristic standpoint. The two obviously cared for one another.

Which is why it was surprising when Buffy Summers pulled out a wooden stake and drove it into Angel's chest. She barely looked like Sarah Michelle Gellar at all.

I came out of the soulgaze with a start and stumbled. Angel made motion to catch me, but I blew it off by stopping myself.

"So." I started.

"You aren't Willow." Angel bluntly stated.

"What was your first clue?" I asked. "Actually, please don't answer that." I really preferred not to know what people saw in my soul. I might not have been able to hide it from them, but I'd very much rather hide it from myself.

"What was that?" Angel asked.

"Soulgaze. Basically you saw my soul, and I saw yours." I answered, and looked around. Cordelia looked a bit annoyed.

"Could we please get going now?" Cordelia asked. "We should find Summers and have her end this."

"If Buffy got her costume where Willow got hers, she might be just as affected as I am. Willow is. Whatever." I said, trying to bring this episode to mind.

"There's somewhere we can go to find out more about it." Angel said. I couldn't believe that I was trusting a vampire, but given the contents of his soul… I had to give him the benefit of the doubt. He may not have been a good man, but he wanted to be.

"Where?" I asked.

"Sunnydale High Library." Angel answered. "We should go to see Giles."

Well, a library would probably have books on rituals and maybe there might have been something in those books that would help to end this, but Ursiel was still out there. The Denarian was from my world, not this one, and I felt responsible for it.

"You two go." I said, calmly checking each of my implements as I looked around. There seemed to be less of the small monsters around, but I couldn't tell why.

"What about you?" Angel asked. "You might not be Willow, but that _is_ her body."

"Don't worry about me, Angel. I've got some business I need to attend to." Hmm. Odd. I seemed to be missing a familiar lump from my jacket pocket. Did I not have my gun?

"Dresden, what are you planning on doing?" Angel asked, a bit more forceful.

Stars and stones, my gun was missing. Well, at least I had my magical implements.

Grinning at Angel, I said, "I'm going to be vewy vewy quiet. I'm hunting bears."

* * *

I must admit that hunting down Ursiel likely wasn't one of my better ideas, but I couldn't live with myself knowing that it was out there and I wasn't doing anything about it. Normally, if I were to run into one of the Fallen in say, Chicago, I would probably expect that not long afterward, I would be seeing either a dark-skinned Russian man or a lighter-skinned American. Sanya and Michael Carpenter, the two living Knights of the Cross stood against the Fallen and other supernatural badness while wielding swords forged with nails supposedly from the Crucifixion. Yes, those nails, that Cross. Esperacchius, the Sword of Hope, was wielded by Sanya, while Amoracchius, the Sword of Love was wielded by Michael. I hadn't seen either of the men in a couple years, nor had I really wanted to with Lasciel's shadow in my mind, but I was the current steward of Fidelacchius, the Sword of Faith. I was asked to find it an appropriate new owner by Shiro Yoshimo before he died.

I had yet to find anyone worthy.

Of course, all that was moot here. This was Sunnydale, California, on a different Earth entirely than our own. I was all there was that stood between Ursiel and its goal. The fact that it had business with me made it personal as well. I wasn't entirely sure how it had recognized me, given my current state of body, but I would cross the bridge when I came to it. I was a Wizard, after all, and a master of snark-fu. I could piss off a fae queen at thirty paces. Finding out Ursiel's beef would be easy.

"Perhaps you should not be so overconfident, my host." The shade of Lasciel appeared near me. Now she wore a copy of the clothing I'd seen Buffy wearing in the soulgaze with Angel. "After all, if you get hurt, this is not your body taking the damage, but young Willow's."

"I won't let her get hurt." I said instantly as I continued down the intersection. Cordelia and Angel had gone off to speak to that Giles person, but I needed to focus. "And Ursiel's going to try to find me one way or the other, so I'd like to find him first."

"If you wish, my host. But perhaps you should let this world's Champion handle things instead." Lasciel started. It might even have been a good idea. Let Buffy handle things here. Surely, if she were this world's champion, she'd be able to handle Ursiel no problem. Except there were two problems with that theory. One, Buffy Summers might have been the Slayer normally, but that was no guarantee that she was this night. If she wore a costume that altered that state, she could be anything from a vanilla mortal to one of the monsters. Heck, she could be Ursiel herself. Two, it didn't sit right with me letting some girl go off to fight my battle. Buffy was a decade younger than me at least, and she had no magic other than a mystical empowerment.

"Like Hell. Ursiel is my fight, Lasciel, mine and the Knights, but I'm the only one here. If you're not going to be helpful, leave." I said, finding what I hoped was a bit of Ursiel's blood on the ground where it got hit by Angel's impala.

"Very well, Harry." Lasciel bowed her head as I glanced up at her. "You should know, Willow is aware." Lasciel abruptly disappeared after saying that.

Stars and Stones, Willow was aware? Meaning she could see and hear everything I was doing? Obviously she couldn't interact with me directly, but somehow Lasciel's shadow knew. I suppose it made sense, Lasciel and my darker side had been talking for a long while before I even met her. That didn't make it okay. Willow also was a younger girl whose body I happened to be occupying. That she was aware and Lasciel's Shade was here as well had me wondering. What was going on with my body back in Chicago?

Before continuing to panic, I remembered the task at hand. I just had to be even more careful. I wouldn't let Willow get hurt if I could help it, but nor could I leave Ursiel to act as it pleased. I needed to find it. With the blood… Well, it would be too easy.

I may be a magical thug when it comes to my evocation, but thaumaturgy was where I shined. Locator spells, especially, were my forte. I tended to use them with the most common business I got. I may have mentioned this before, but I use my magic to make a living. I'm even in the phone book, under Wizard. I'm the only entry in Chicago; it's impossible to miss.

 **Harry Dresden  
WIZARD  
**Lost Items Found **  
**Paranormal Investigations  
Consulting – Advice – Reasonable Rates  
No Love Potions, Endless Purses, Parties or Other Entertainment

I'm so good with finding things that I put it into my advertisement. A locator spell was exactly what I needed in order to find Ursiel here, and while I didn't have all of the components I usually used, I could make do with what I did have. Pulling off my pentacle amulet, or at least the replica this spell had created anyway, I bent down and put some of what I hoped was Ursiel's blood onto it. I then drew a circle around myself, using a piece of painted asphalt that had come up with Ursiel's movements. Closing the circle took a simple act of will, basic sorcery. I needed to shut out the outside interference as I built up the power for this spell. Unlike before I got into this mess, the circle actually closed, and almost instantly, I could feel the difference. Whatever was wrong with this town, it was far more than just the spell that brought me here. If I remembered right, Sunnydale was the home to a Hellmouth, which… In practical terms, probably meant it was in an area where the Nevernever was close.

While I would love to study the effects beyond what I had felt outside versus inside my circle, I did have a spell to cast and a Fallen Angel to find. I briefly considered using Hellfire to empower this spell, given that I was trying to track a Fallen, but I discarded that thought. Hellfire was great for empowering evocation to get a bigger boom, but this was more delicate. I needed to know which way to go.

" _Interessari, interressarium…_ " I chanted, repeating myself as the power built up. As the power of the spell reached a crescendo, I broke the circle, and immediately my pentacle pulled in a direction. Given that I wasn't driving across town to follow this, I decided to just follow the spell as best I could. After all, Sunnydale wasn't all that big a town. I just loathed to imagine what Ursiel was doing at that very moment.

The spell took me past a number of storefronts, and then out of the commercial district. Each time that I passed a cemetery, I noted its presence, and moved on. Sunnydale certainly had a lot of them. I counted five before the spell changed direction again and brought me into the Industrial district. It looked like at one point in time, Sunnydale had been an Industrial player. There were a few factories that looked long-since abandoned, the railroad tracks, and what looked like a set of shipping docks.

I noted a sign on one of the factories which looked to be repurposed. It appeared to be some sort of nightclub, "The Bronze." Near there was where the spell seemed to be pulling. Taking a few steps in either direction to try to triangulate had the same effect. The Bronze it was.

Multiple screams echoed out from the nightclub, and I ran in, ignoring the sign about a cover charge, and the Bouncer seemed to not even care at the moment.

Inside was a madhouse, and at the center of it was Ursiel. The Fallen stalked through the crowd, nipping at people, one by one before letting out a bellowing roar which shook the windows. Normally, this club would have had people dancing on the dancefloor, sitting at the couches, listening to music played on the stages, but all of that was out the window with Ursiel there. It appeared to be searching for something… or someone.

I moved to try to engage it, to stop or slow it down somehow, but I was stopped by a slender hand holding out a cane by its top.

"Hold, please." Instinctively I grabbed onto the cane with my left hand, listening to the accented female voice. With a flourish, the voice's owner pulled on the cane, drawing a katana from within the cane-shaped sheath. The Japanese blade lit up brightly illuminating the face and blonde hair of Buffy Summers. Her face was solemn as she looked over at Ursiel, brandishing the katana like someone who didn't just know how to use it, but someone who was born to use it. "Oi! Ursiel! Let them go. You have no power here!"

The familiarity of the situation struck me as I noticed how Buffy was dressed. Her outfit resembled that of a young samurai in training. She had loose, pleated trousers on with a gi shirt overtop a tee shirt. She resembled how Shiro had dressed when he acted as my Second. Her hair even was in a loose topknot. No, this couldn't be right. Surely the spell that brought me here couldn't have done that as well.

Ursiel reared up and faced Buffy. His voice came silkily as he spoke once more. "I had heard that you were dead, Yoshimo. Killed by Anduriel and Nicodemus."

"The dead have ways of walking again, Ursiel." Buffy said, her voice tinged with Shiro's accent. "Let them and your new host go, you have no power here."

"That is where you are wrong, Yoshimo! You may be youthful once more, but you cannot beat me without the help of your other Knights." Ursiel boasted.

"I may not have my fellow Knights, Ursiel, but I have something just as good." Shiro said, nodding to me as I stepped forward.

"You said it before, Ursiel." I started as I leveled my staff at the Fallen. "We do have unfinished business."


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter Seven

* * *

Disclaimer: I own nothing used here. See first chapter for full disclaimer.

* * *

The absurdity of the situation struck me. I was standing in the middle of a nightclub within a fictional town, in the body of a female fictional inhabitant of the town, and I was about to throw down with a Nickelhead that had taken three Knights of the Cross to defeat during our first encounter. Of course, then I had been knocked flat due to Ursiel's psychic presence, but I knew better now. While I probably hadn't soulgazed Ursiel's current host, I knew to avoid the eyes and focus on its bigger body. Additionally, I had the help of a Knight.

A Knight who admittedly was now small and blonde rather than small, old and Japanese, but Shiro was a Knight of the Cross all the same. As such, the impending combat began the only way it could.

"To whoever is under there, you can fight this. You do not need Ursiel. Give up the coin." Shiro's accent really did sound odd coming out of a blonde American girl's mouth, but it wasn't completely unnatural.

Ursiel laughed. "It's useless, Yoshimo. My current host is mine completely. You will not sway him away from me."

Great, that meant either Ursiel's host was willingly taking part in this, which given how Denarians acted and the fact that they needed you to give up your will was something entirely possible, or the host was some poor shmuck who thought adding a silver coin to his Halloween costume wouldn't be a bad thing. Given that Buffy the Vampire Slayer had no Nickelheads in it, I was leaning the latter.

"Well, that's a shame." I commented as I channeled power down my staff. " _Forzare!_ " A wave of force slammed into Ursiel's ursine form, driving him back toward the stage. He rolled with the blow, pushing himself onto the stage, from which he lunged at Shiro, swinging a massive claw.

Shiro caught the claw with his, I mean her blade, _Fidelacchius_ proving to be the real thing as it started to cut through the claws, severing them off of Ursiel's paw and she flipped backward. I took my cue and unleashed another wave of force, this time from my rings, unleashing all of the remaining force in them.

The stage splintered, but Ursiel managed to dig his claws into it, slowing his movement to a stop. It was time for the patented Harry Dresden wit to rile him up and get him to focus where I needed him to.

"Grandma, what big bruises you must have." I'll admit, I have done better, but there was something about being able to pitch my voice this way that I liked for this sort of taunt. "Oh wait, that was a wolf. Something something about your porridge?"

Ursiel roared and charged at me. I moved to dodge, but the bearlike Fallen was faster. He repeated the movements of the mini-MacFinn from earlier and leaped. While he didn't exactly land directly on me, he managed to catch me in the back as he passed, knocking me to my knees. I found myself silently thanking whoever powered this spell that had me here for making sure my coat came with all of its enchantments.

Of course, now I had a bear in my face. Lifting my shield bracelet, I muttered the incantation and brought a shield up just as Ursiel's claws were about to come at my face. They scraped against the shield, the kinetic force pushing me back to my feet, but no further.

"Come on. I can do this all day." Well. Not really, but I only needed to hold it off just long enough. Of course, then the Fallen opened its mouth. I braced myself in preparation for the bite attack.

"Drop flat on the ground and roll to the right, my host." Lasciel's voice filtered into my ear. I waffled for just a second. "Now would be preferable, Harry!"

I dropped down, perhaps a little too hard, and rolled. The acrid sulfuric smell of brimstone reached my nose as I ignored feelings I hadn't had before in favor of paying attention to the gout of flame leaping from Ursiel's maw.

"Stars and Stones, that's Hellfire." I muttered, using my staff to pick myself up.

"Ursiel must have noticed the deficiency in your shield, my host." Lasciel sounded winded, but she continued on. "He has not, however, noticed the Knight's approach."

Shiro led with her right foot as she dashed at Ursiel's side. Fidelacchius's glow burned untainted by the flames of Hellfire that licked furniture near me. With a glimmering slash, she forced Ursiel to his side, six feet away and bleeding. Hell's Bells, that was almost as far as I'd been able to knock him with magic.

"Get up, Harry. There still remains work to do." She offered me her hand, and I took it. Power radiated from the blonde's grip, and not all of it came from being a Knight. I could feel a darker power working with the light. Was that the Slayer?

I pulled myself to my feet, and pulled out my blasting rod. I needed a bit more stopping power.

"Shiro, there are people attempting to end the spell." I said quietly, keeping my eyes trained on Ursiel's prone, regenerating form. If the spell ended soon enough, whoever had the misfortune of getting Ursiel's coin would return to normal, in theory. So we simply needed to hold him here until that happened

Shiro nodded. "Hai. It should not be much longer."

Ursiel laughed as it stood up. "Indeed, you will not last much longer. Surely you feel it, Wizard. The darkness that permeates this town. Infesting everything."

"Oh please don't turn this into a 'we're not so different, you and I' speech." I complained. "That was old when Nicodemus did it, and it got him nowhere. _Fuego!_ "

A blast of flame leaped from my blasting rod, slamming into what should have been Ursiel's hide, but the Fallen must have anticipated my spell as he dodged backward, causing my spell to ignite some band equipment. Shiro took the initiative and charged, sword gleaming with holy light. Fidelacchius bit into the Fallen's flesh, setting me up for another spell.

" _Fuego!_ " This time my spell struck true, burning into Ursiel's side as Shiro continued her own attack. I caught a glimpse of a spinning slash, parrying a claw from Ursiel about to dig into her side, even as I spun up my staff in my left hand, bringing it up into the bearlike Fallen's jaw. " _Forzare!_ "

A blast of force sent Ursiel tumbling backward, but it quickly scrambled to his feet. Ursiel opened his maw wide and this time I could see the glow indicating what was coming. I ran and jumped behind the bar as Ursiel unleashed another gout of Hellfire, this time lasting much longer and spreading over a wider area. Shiro jumped over the bar, landing on top of me as flames licked over the top of the bar.

The unfortunate thing about ducking behind a bar in a fight like this was simply that you could not see anything beyond what was above you. I couldn't tell from sight where Ursiel was, nor could I tell what he was doing beyond the flames. If he were smart, he'd be approaching the bar, getting ready to attack. Without the ability to rely on my eyes, I had to rely on other senses instead. I Listened.

Other than the sound of burning wood and crackling flames, I could hear nothing. No footsteps, no growling, not even breathing beyond my own and that of Shiro atop me. It wasn't the nothing that came with a veil, but it was just… nothing. Ursiel wasn't there.

"I think he's gone." I whispered to Shiro, who then propped herself up to see over the bar, using my shoulders as a support.

"Seems to be." As relief flooded through me, I couldn't help what I realized just then. The position the two of us were in, and our current bodies... Buffy was a _very_ attractive girl, despite her age. Perhaps it was a good thing I wasn't in my own body at the moment.

"Hey, Shiro… you mind?" Shiro looked down at me, and blushed a bit as she got off.

"Sorry, Harry." I shrugged, looking away as my own cheeks heated up, from the warmth of the flames. Standing, I looked around.

"Yeah, it looks like Ursiel retreated. Damn." Wait, what if he had heard me about the spell ending soon. Did Ursiel have the skill with magic to trace the spell's source?

"Given that we did not want to kill Ursiel, due to the spell in place, this perhaps is for the best." Shiro said as she too stood. She grabbed my arm and pulled me around the bar. "But we should be having this discussion outside."

I blinked a couple times, and then I saw it. Smoke, fire… that was a lot of it. We'd been spared the brunt of the flames by ducking behind the metal bar, but all of the wood was burning. Fire had started to burn the liquor behind the bar as well. I followed Shiro toward the door, which she kicked open. _Fidelacchius_ remained unsheathed in the hand that wasn't pulling me. We'd barely made it twenty feet before the fire exploded outward, the force of which sending Shiro and I forward and knocking _Fidelacchius_ from her grip.

"Well, well, well, isn't this a right sight?" An oddly familiar British-accented male voice came from an alleyway nearby, and I looked toward it. Standing in the entrance to the alleyway, flanked by child-sized monsters and vampires in their demonic visages was a pale blond man in a leather coat and leather pants. "Dru did say that tonight was going to be different. Though, she did imply that the Slayer was going to be weaker tonight, not a Holy Samurai. Bloody 'ell. That sword."

"Who are you supposed to be, a Billy Idol groupie?" I commented as I used my staff to get to my feet. Shiro edged toward the sword.

"Oh, Red. You should know by now that Billy Idol stole this look from _me_." Spike. That was his name. He looked different than I remembered him looking in the show, and he sounded… Well, that was the strange bit. He sounded like a British version of _me._ If I had suddenly started speaking with a natural cockney accent, that would be Spike.

Well, not at the moment, obviously, but normally.

"So you thought it was a good idea to, what? Gather up the kids in costume, team up with them to come after us?" I asked, Shiro still edging for _Fidelacchius_.

"About the size of it, yeah." Spike commented. "There's only two of you, and I'm betting the big scary softened you up a bit."

Oh God, I remembered Spike showing up in the later seasons of Buffy and actually being helpful, but he was a _vampire_ and not even one with a soul. It took nearly all I had to restrain myself from just frying him on the spot.

"Oh, the big bad Spike, has to let an angel do the dirty work for him. Like always." I wasn't sure if that was too much, but Spike's face rippled into his own demonic visage, revealing him for the vampire he was.

"Get them, but remember… the Slayer is mine!" Spike's minions ran forward faster than the costume possessed children.

I smiled.

" _Pyrofuego!"_ I swung my blasting rod in an arc, releasing a wave of flame above the children's heads. Each vampire it struck burst into flames immediately, and it hit more than half of what was there. After three seconds of being on fire, the burning vampires collapsed into dust. "That'll put marzipan in your pie plate, bingo!"

The childlike monsters swarmed Shiro and I, using our reluctance to actually hurt them against us. I pushed them away with wind and force, and Shiro used _Fidelacchius_ 's sheathe combined with some unarmed attacks to get them moving. Vampires that got close got a _fuego_ to the face, but it seemed like they were endless, even as we whittled them down.

Spike, for his part, managed to hold his own. He hadn't noticed that I wasn't targeting him with the fire as he consistently went after Shiro, who rolled to recover _Fidelacchius_. Spike stayed out of reach of the holy blade, but came in to give individual attacks. I had to hand it to the vampire. He had skills.

A lucky hit knocked Fidelacchius loose, followed up by a grab. No longer was I thinking of the future of the show as Spike prepared to drink from Shiro. I would not let the man who saved my life die a second time if I could prevent it. Nor would I allow the girl whose body he was in be killed through my inaction.

Raising my blasting rod, I aimed at Spike, sulfuric wood smoke reaching my nostrils. The tip lit up as the spell's words formed on my lips. " _Pyr-_ "

The world went white and then black. I opened my eyes, and found myself staring at a moving ceiling fan, right hand outstretched, but no blasting rod within it. While I could cast the spell I was building up without a blasting rod, there was no target in front of me for me to cast on.

I released the power into myself and looked around. I was laying on a sofa, as to the left of me was its back. Across from the sofa was an unplugged flat screen television. I could see the plug hanging out from the socket. Looked like all of the electronics were unplugged. Smart. I wouldn't break them that way.

Next to me was a coffee table, upon which were a few magazines. "A Passion for Polka," "Weird Al's Polka problem," "Polka Magazine." Well, that answered where I was. I noticed that the chair near the couch I was on had been occupied recently, with its blanket and pillow behind it. A mug sat on the table near it with a white ceramic coaster underneath. I could see an accordion print peeking out from under the mug.

It was at that point I realized two things. One, Butters really did have a comfortable couch, and two, I was completely lying flat upon it. I looked to my hands, and while they were definitely my hands, they were not _my_ hands. My left hand was gloveless, and rather than being the charred hunk of meat it had been, instead it was perfectly soft skin with dainty fingers. I looked down at myself further, and I frowned.

Normally this sort of realization would be cause for some alarm, but my time in Sunnydale had gotten me used to at least temporarily being in this sort of thing. Still, I had expected upon my return to Chicago that I would be returning to normal.

So I simply said the only words that immediately came to mind appropriate for the situation. "Oh… poopy…"

* * *

Judging from the polka memorabilia, I had a sneaking suspicion that somehow I ended up at Butters's house. I was even fairly certain _why_ I had been brought here as opposed to somewhere else. Butters lived close to the morgue, knew Ramirez, and no one wanted to get caught by my wards while carrying an unconscious me. Without someone who knew how to deactivate them, my wards would fry most anyone who tried to enter, at least if they had supernatural power. Thieves would just get a sharp jolt, enough to deter them.

So I had been brought to Butters's place, and he'd taken care to magic-proof his electronics beforehand. Sitting up, I suppressed a yawn and looked down at myself. I wasn't wearing my duster, and I was swimming in my long-sleeved shirt. Somehow my pants had been removed, but I still had some dignity in that I had my boxers, which were loose as well. My feet and legs were bare, feminine, and if those legs had been on someone other than me, I'd probably be giving them second and third looks.

Hey, I'm… I was a guy.

Sitting up had me realize one more thing. Something that was remarkably pressing despite my situation. I'd have to deal with it before dealing with anything else.

I had to pee. Damnit.

I stood up, and I looked for where the bathroom would be. The hallway looked promising, and as I turned to go down, I nearly bumped into Butters, who was wearing his glasses. Backing away slightly to avoid a collision, I noticed the height difference between us was significantly smaller.

"Oh… Harry… You're awake…" Butters commented, quite obviously looking toward my face but not my eyes.

"You recognize me?" I asked, a little confused.

"Oh good, you _are_ Harry…" Butters breathed a sigh of relief. "Carlos was pretty certain you'd still be you, but after the changes…"

"Right… the changes…" I trailed off, looking down at myself.

"Warden Chase and Yoshimo did the changing. Carlos, Bill and I were preparing the food. They didn't fully change you out of things, but Warden Chase said she'd be back with some clothes for when you woke up." Butters said, his face turning slightly red.

"Right. I uh… need to… bathroom." I motioned down the hall.

"Second door on the right." Butters replied quickly before heading into the living room. I followed his instructions and entered into the bathroom. Ignoring my normal habitual ways, I flicked on the light in there. Butters's bathroom was decorated much as his living room had been. He had matching accordion towels, drum-shaped soap containers, and even some sheet music wallpaper.

Without going into too much detail, let's just say that a girl or woman is different than I was used to. Messier too. I cleaned myself up and stood to wash my hands, looking into the mirror over the sink. Now I don't really have any mirrors in my house; they're not exactly safe to keep around for someone in my profession. Mirrors can be used as portals for some nasty things to come out of the Nevernever. Most people don't have these sorts of issues, but I did.

I looked… different. Well, of course I looked different, I was a girl now, but while I hadn't gotten a very good look at what Willow looked like over in Sunnydale, the person reflected back in the mirror was not Willow Rosenberg. She could easily have been a relation to the girl, but Willow's hair was not black with red streaks, nor was she as tall as I appeared to be. Willow had been about Butters's height, and I clearly had a head on him. Additionally, I could pick out familiar shapes in my reflection. My jawline and eyes remained the same, though my lips curled up into a slight pout. I remained lithe, retaining a runner's build, but I couldn't say that the woman in the mirror was unattractive. Woman was also accurate, as I clearly wasn't a sixteen-year-old girl. No, I was closer in age to Wardens Chase and Yoshimo than Willow Rosenberg if I'd had to guess. Perhaps the slightest bit younger.

I got knocked out of my examination by a knocking on the bathroom door. "Harry, are you okay in there?"

"Fine, Butters." I called back.

"Good, it's just that… the Wardens are back. They've got some clothing for you to choose from." Butters said.

"I'll be right out." I didn't want to pick from clothes bought by Warden Chase. I wanted _my_ clothes. It might have been a little unreasonable, perhaps even selfish, but I bought those clothes. My coat was a gift to me from Susan. They were _mine_.

"All right, I'll let them know." Butters stepped away from the door. All right, this was it, Dresden. They knew it was me, and I'd pretty much blown any chance I had of pretending otherwise. Anyway, they probably managed to keep me alive if I'd collapsed under that external magic influence… Whatever spell transformed me and sent me to Sunnydale… I owed it to them.

Opening the bathroom door, I made my way back toward the living room, and I paused at the entryway. Wardens Chase, Yoshimo, Ramirez, and Meyers were standing there in their grey cloaks, swords and knives remained sheathed. In front of Warden Chase were several shopping bags from stores that I really didn't recognize the names of. Standing to the right of them was a young woman with a sweet pretty face, curly brown hair, and a smile that dimpled up so nicely that it was almost too perfect. Anastasia Luccio, Commander of the Wardens of the White Council had acquired that body earlier this year when a necromancer had forcibly switched bodies with her in order to attempt to have us kill her.

To her left was a man of innocuous height, a bit taller than I was now. His dark hair was plaited in a long braid, and age seamed his features, warm and worn. He had dark eyes, wore eagle feathers in his braid, bits of bone in a necklace around his throat, and he had a beaded bracelet around a forearm, in which he held a simple uncarved staff. Wizard Joseph Listens-to-Wind, a member of the Senior Council had arrived. Normally I called him Injun Joe, but normally I was taller than him.

To _his_ left, I could see that Injun Joe wasn't the final person. The man standing there was someone I knew quite well. His bald head gleamed in the overhead light of Butters's living room fan. Despite his being dressed in a simple coat over a black shirt and denim overalls, I knew how powerful he was. His beard looked like it had been trimmed lately. This man was my mentor, the one who had taken me in and taught me the 'why' of magic. This man had taken me in when my fate had been assured to be death, and he had helped a young man become what I am today. This man was also a fraud. He was the White Council's assassin, able to break the laws of magic freely, using the title of "Blackstaff". He'd caused the Tunguska Explosion, the New Madrid Earthquake, and Krakatoa. He'd even brought down a Soviet satellite on the Red Court… This man taught me things he didn't even practice, and he too, was on the Senior Council.

Ebenezar McCoy, my mentor looked to me and said, "Hello, Hoss."


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter Eight

* * *

Disclaimer: See the first chapter. I own nothing

* * *

The four Wardens I was responsible for, Warden-Captain Luccio, Joseph Listens-to-Wind, and my mentor, Ebenezar McCoy stood in my friend Butters's living room waiting for me to respond. I'm sure what probably had happened was Ramirez had reported whatever had happened to me to home office, and apparently it was enough to get Luccio and two members of the Senior Council interested in what was going on in _my_ city. Whatever Ramirez had said, it had them standing here, and after I had reacted the way I had to Ebenezar when I found out about the Blackstaff… Something happened.

"Um…" Stars and stones, I sounded _so_ articulate, but to be blindsided by this many people when I was only expecting Ramirez and the others had me almost at a loss for words. "So, where's the party Ebenezar? Don't tell me the Council Christmas party is being hosted at a vanilla mortal's place. Think of the technology we'd be busting."

Did I say loss for words? At least I wasn't babbling, but that wasn't exactly up to my usual snark and optimism when dealing with the Senior Council.

"Pardon, Hoss Dresden." Injun Joe stepped forward and locked eyes with me, but I looked away. I wasn't going to be caught in an unprepared soulgaze.

"What's the big idea here?" I asked. Might as well be blunt about it. "I was expecting Ramirez, Yoshimo, Chase and Meyers. I just woke up."

"Hell's bells, boy." Ebenezar spoke up. "You've been through some sort of transfiguration, and you think that they won't call in the experts?"

"Peace, Ebenezar, Hoss Dresden." Injun Joe interjected. "Hoss Dresden, I need to verify that you are still yourself. The best way to do that is through a soulgaze. Will you consent to one?"

Now, truth be told, I can't say that I didn't understand their reasoning. I didn't look like myself, given the… Well, let's call them additions to my body and missing areas in others. I assumed that Ramirez had probably called in what had happened to ask for some advice and it had prompted… Well, this. A soulgaze would definitely reveal that I was still myself and quite a bit more. I doubted that it would reveal the presence of Lasciel's Shadow, given that I'd had others where she hadn't been revealed. It even made sense that Injun Joe would be the one to do it. Ebenezar had soulgazed me years ago, the first thing we did when he took me in. It was something about needing me able to look him in the eye. Injun Joe was one of the few on the Senior Council he trusted; so his judgement would be appropriate.

I sighed and nodded. "Sure, Injun Joe. I'll do one."

I ignored the sounds that came from Yoshimo and Meyers, they probably were outraged or something at my comment, and I locked eyes with the shaman. His dark pools engulfed my vision, drawing me in like a black hole. I tipped over the event horizon and I felt the soulgaze begin.

Every soulgaze is different. Every person experiences it differently. I've heard of people hearing music, smelling and tasting the soul, and one even claimed to see them as some sort of interpretive dance. Me? I get blaring, in your face, three-dimensional feasts of sight and sound, or at least I normally do. What I experienced with Injun Joe was significantly different.

He was a shaman, a leader to a long-gone people, who carried the weight of their disappearance with every step he took. He stood on the Council because it was the right thing to do, to lead and gather those who could learn his wisdom. He'd had few apprentices, each with their own successes and failures, and while he felt pride at their accomplishments, he bore the weight of each failure as his own. Joseph Listens-to-Wind had seen much during his time on this Earth, and he would still see more as time went on, ever shifting his shape to what was necessary, bringing his resolve forward. The very essence of nature grew within Injun Joe, cycling from life to death and back again. Within him the forest was thick enough with good growth among the bad that it was hard to see the whole of it for the trees. Though he bore the shame and guilt of his past, he would not allow it to break him, only allowing it to strengthen his will.

I don't know what I had expected to see in Injun Joe's soulgaze, nor did I want to know what he had seen in mine. I know how some had reacted in the past, but I doubted that a member of the Senior Council would faint upon seeing my soul.

"Hoss Dresden, what have you done to yourself?" Injun Joe murmured to me before raising his voice to the entire room. "This indeed is Warden Harry Dresden, albeit in a transformed state."

The relief that passed through the room was palpable. The Wardens seemed the most relieved, and Warden Chase seemed to be mouthing something about telling them so.

"Okay." I said. "So I'm me. I understand the need to verify my identity with a soulgaze. Why exactly did that mean you three had to come? Carlos verified Captain Luccio there with a soulgaze on Halloween, why couldn't they have done the same for me?"

"Warden Dresden," Luccio's accented voice had me smiling. "The Senior Council had to confirm my identity as well before I was allowed to return to my position. Wizard Peabody did the confirmation himself, on orders of the Merlin. This was done while I was healing, but it still did need to happen."

"So why now?" They easily could have temporarily identified me through Carlos, Yoshimo, Chase or Meyers and done the formal identification later. There was something more to this. "Surely you didn't come all this way just to soulgaze me."

"Hoss, Injun Joe's got an eye for transfiguration and healing. He's probably the best person to look at what happened to you." Ebenezar said.

I looked to the man, and he nodded. "I have looked already… and what has happened to you is very complicated, Hoss Dresden."

Of course it was. I was nearly a foot shorter, and my gender was completely the opposite of what it should have been. However, just because it was complicated didn't mean that the solution wasn't going to be nice and simple. Usually spells like this wouldn't last past a few sunrises. The rising sun would weaken the spell until it released its hold completely.

"How complicated?" I needed to ask.

"Complicated enough that I will need to do some research on what I have observed. Perhaps you will return to normal upon the next sunrise, but there is reason to doubt it." Injun Joe said, apologetically clasping my shoulder.

"Why would there be reason to doubt it?" I asked.

"You were unconscious for two days already, Harry." Carlos said. "And the sun rose a short while before Butters called us this morning."

Oh. Poopy.

* * *

Chase gave me a bag of clothing and I was led back into Butters's bedroom and left alone. Captain Luccio, Warden Yoshimo, and Warden Chase all had offered to help if I felt it absolutely necessary, but I knew my way around most of these items already. Just because I hadn't been with anyone in a couple years didn't mean that I was completely hopeless. In the end, I picked and chose from the options Warden Chase had laid out, something that looked comfortable but didn't exactly scream 'girly girl' when I wore it. I would not be wearing any makeup, nor would I have anything done with my hair save for a basic brushing. I did see the value in the underwear, even if I felt off wearing it.

In the end, I found myself dressed in a long-sleeved blouse over top of some dark blue jeans. Warden Chase had picked out some flat bottomed leather boots for me to wear which, while feminine, were definitely good for running in. Perhaps in another life, she'd been some sort of fashionista, or at least she had some sort of eye for clothing. Maybe she already knew the size I was going to be… or, given that I was out for two days, perhaps she managed to get a measure of my body in.

Two days. Two days unconscious while my mind was in Sunnydale and my body was changing. It was a good thing that I apparently dragged Lasciel's shadow with me, as I don't want to imagine what she would have done while in control of my body, assuming that's what would have happened. Hmm… Lasciel's shadow might have known of a way to change me back, but as quickly as that thought popped into my head I discarded it. While it was entirely possible that the Fallen's shadow could help me manipulate my form to return to normal, the price extracted would be… Well, it would probably involve picking up the coin. That was something I would not allow myself to do.

That did not mean that other possibilities didn't exist. I wasn't entirely certain how much Bob knew about human transformations. He knew a lot about werewolves, lycanthropes, hexenwulfen and Loup Garous a few years ago, but all I was able to find out from him was how they worked. I never tried exactly to find out how werewolves use their spell; it never seemed all that useful to me. If I needed a werewolf's help, I'd just call up the Alphas, and they'd help to the best of their ability. I wouldn't know what Bob could do about the situation until I asked him.

Looking down at myself and recalling what I had seen in the mirror, I heaved out a sigh. I was a good looking woman. Assuming Bob recognized me, I'm not even sure how he would react. Still, the spirit was one of my best friends, and I did owe it to him to at least ask.

Another possibility would be to track down the source of the spell. If something was continuously powering the transformation, in theory, stopping the power at its source would allow me to change back naturally. I'd still need to get Bob's help to get an idea of what I was looking for. Little Chicago wasn't finished yet, and while this would be a great thing to try to test the concept, it needed a bit more work, more time. So I'd have to investigate the old fashioned way, and I had just the plan to do so.

I was interrupted from my musings by a knock on the door. Quickly following the knock, Ebenezar's voice echoed through the closed door, "Hoss, are you decent?"

Looking down at myself and my folded men's clothes next to me on the bed, I answered, "Decent enough, I suppose."

The door creaked open and my mentor stepped in. His eyes widened as he looked me over. "Stars and stones, Hoss. I almost didn't recognize you."

"Yeah, it's the boobs, right? Too much?" I asked, despite my chest being covered and fairly well at that.

"No, Hoss… It's just… you look comfortable… content, even." Ebenezar said, shaking his head. "I don't know how you can be."

"What do you want me to do?" I asked, standing up. Normally this would have put me as towering over my former mentor, but now my eye level was just above his shoulder. That was severely strange. "What do you think I should do? Scream and rage and rant about how this isn't fair? That I'm not in the right body? Sir, you taught me better than that. Sure, it isn't fair. Life's never fair, and that's a lesson I was given a harsh introduction to even before I met you."

"All right, Hoss. I just worry about you sometimes." Ebenezar said in a placating manner. "A lot has happened, with the war, and with what Luccio said about Halloween. Riding a dinosaur, boy, really?"

"I was more worried about what was happening with the Darkhallow than having the dinosaur do anything out of control. The two Council wi-"

Ebenezar placed a finger at my lips, silencing me. "Not something to talk about when we're not behind safe walls. I will need to talk with you about it later though."

I nodded. "So, what did you want, sir?" I wasn't going to let him pass any more hypocritical stuff onto me, but that didn't mean that the respect I'd had for him had waned. Whether he practiced what he preached or not, what he preached was a good way to look at magic. I'd long since taken it to heart.

"What I want, Hoss," Ebenezar began, looking me in the eyes as he spoke, "is for you to let the Wardens who are here find out who did this to you. Your transformation is too new and could be volatile. "

So, he wanted me to sit the investigation out. He didn't want me finding out how I had been changed into the woman I now was. "Like Hell! I'm not going to sit out and wait for everything to be done! You've known me how long, sir? Investigating this sort of thing is my job. My livelihood."

"Investigating black magic is the job of the Wardens, Hoss." Ebenezar started.

I cut him off, "And as of Halloween, I am a Warden! Gray cloak and everything. I've got the mandate to protect my city against black magic, and you should know that!"

"Damnit Maggie, just listen for once!" Ebenezar nearly shouted. "I mean, Hoss… This is dangerous territory. They changed you, and who knows what else they can do? Whoever they are."

He'd called me my mother's name. I knew he taught her, but I didn't think I looked that much like her. Oh well, that would be something to deal with later. Right now, I needed to get him understanding what was going on in my end. I breathed in and out, calming myself.

"Sir. Wizard McCoy. While I may not have asked to become a Warden, I have been given that responsibility." I kept myself as calm as I could while talking. I needed to say this right to let Ebenezar know I was serious. "I am responsible for Chicago and the surrounding area to the East Coast. I will _not_ let something like being changed from my natural form obstruct me from doing my job. Because it's mine to do."

Ebenezar nodded, and apparently ignored what he called me. I would too, for now. "I suppose you can, Hoss. My request wasn't a Senior Council thing… just a request from the guy who taught you."

"I'm going to do my job, sir." I said, perhaps a bit forcefully. "Chicago is my city, and whoever did this to me is _here_. Additionally, I've got killers and grave robbers to find."

"Okay, Hoss. I'll update the Council." Ebenezar stood up and headed toward the room's exit. He paused at the doorway, "One more thing, Hoss. You should get to thinking about a name if this lasts too much longer. The Council can create a new identity for you, but you need to pick what you want to be called."

Ah right. That. That was the one thing I didn't want to think about.

* * *

I finally came out of the bedroom five minutes after Ebenezar left. I'd needed to collect my thoughts on the situation and what was going on. In addition to what had happened to me, there was far more going on in my city. It would be far too easy to focus on my problems and ignore the ones that I had been contracted to handle, but I had my responsibilities. Lisa Hendricks and her boyfriend had been murdered. Shiro's grave had been robbed, and I had completely forgotten to ask Shiro about it in the confusion dealing with Ursiel. Assuming what had happened in Sunnydale was more than just a fever dream, at some point, I would probably have to find my way back there on purpose. Bob might know more about how to pull that off.

I shut the door behind me, and paused in the hallway. Normally I'd just continue on, but given that Warden-Captain Luccio was standing in my way, I stopped.

"Something… I can help you with, ma'am?"

Something about the way she looked at me made me feel a bit strange, but I waved it off. Captain Luccio was indeed a beautiful woman, especially now, but the reason she was like that was because of _my_ failure. If I'd managed to deal with Corpsetaker sooner, maybe she'd be in her old body still.

"I'm glad that the clothing Warden Chase managed to pick out for you fits, Warden Dresden." Luccio said with a smile. "I am further glad that despite Wizard McCoy's objections, you are still willing to execute the duties of your station."

Well, it wasn't like I'd been quiet in there while talking with Ebenezar. Anyone who had been in the hall probably heard my exclamations and if they'd been curious, they could have listened closely. I nodded to Luccio.

"Well, it's not like the one who did this or the one who killed with magic a few days ago are going to turn themselves in. Chicago's my city. I can't let warlocks do their thing." That said, I didn't exactly agree with the usual punishment for black magic. There were a few exceptions to that.

"Well said, Harry." Luccio said, smiling. "Now… I wanted you to know, that if you need someone to talk to about this… I'm available. I know what it's like to be in a body that is no longer your own."

I nodded. "Going to be honest, Captain, I'm trying not to think about it too much. I'll find a way back to normal, but there's important things to worry about right now."

"Yes, there are, but if this ends up being longer than you might think, Harry… I'd just like you to think about it. I won't judge." Luccio spoke softly. "Now, what are your plans from here, Warden?" Her voice returned to a more normal volume, and my stomach reminded me that I had been asleep for two days, loudly.

"I… suppose that I'm going to get something to eat, and I'll find out what Butters can tell me about the Hendricks case," I said, and then added when Luccio's eyes flit back toward the living room, "I'll take the Wardens with me, don't worry. You asked me to show them my process. This is part of it."

"Of course… I must be getting back to England. There are new apprentices coming in who wish to join the Wardens tomorrow, and I need to evaluate them." Luccio looked pensive for a second. "Wizard Peabody will need a record of these events for history keeping. You should include the way your transformation is making you feel. This could be useful information for the future."

Wizard Peabody was the Council's scribe and historian. He kept track of all the minutes and goings on in the White Council, and he still had time to write books. I'd even read one of them, a useful one by the name of _Die Lied der Erlking_. Well, of course, I hadn't really remembered it when necessary, but Lasciel's shade in disguise ended up remembering it for me. She'd been helpful then. Peabody was also the wizard who had confirmed Luccio's identity for the Senior Council on orders of the Merlin. I had no doubts that he'd do whatever he could with this report to make it seem like I came out in the worst possible light. Peabody didn't like me much.

"I'll get a write-up ready when we've dealt with the warlock or warlocks." I said, offering what I'd hoped was a reassuring smile.

"Good…" She turned to start walking, and I followed her into the living room. Butters was showing Carlos and Meyers something out of one of his polka magazines while Chase and Yoshimo were having a rather animated hushed discussion. All eyes turned to me when I entered the room though, despite Luccio being two steps ahead of me.

Luccio turned toward Butters and offered him a smile and a slight bow. "Doctor Butters, I must thank you for allowing us the use of your house as a refuge for one of my Wardens. You will be compensated for your time out of the expense accounts. I will make sure of it."

"Oh… it was nothing. Harry's a friend, and any friend of Harry's…" Butters trailed off, clearly uncomfortable.

"Nevertheless, you shall be compensated. I'll contact you through Warden Dresden to determine the amount necessary." Luccio said, and then she turned to the rest of the Wardens. "Despite Warden Dresden's… current state, she… _he_ is still your Warden-Commander for this mission. Pay attention to him, and learn from how he does things, but do not be afraid to offer your opinion."

Luccio picked up her staff from where it leaned against the wall and headed toward the front door. She opened it and stepped outside, bundling her robes up as she did so. It had stopped snowing for now, but that didn't mean it wouldn't start again soon. Winter had yet to even formally begin, but it had come early this year. Once she had gone, I looked around to the room.

"So… who's hungry?"


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

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Disclaimer: See first chapter for full disclaimer

* * *

Turned out that I wasn't the only one who wanted to eat, but as I was not only the head Warden here but the victim as well, I got to pick where we were eating. It was too early to go to McAnally's, so clearly there was only one right answer. Certainly, there were dissenting opinions, but I had stated clearly, with a firm look, that we would be eating at my choice. So we piled into two cars, Wardens Ramirez, Yoshimo and Meyers rode with Butters, and Warden Chase decided to come with me in the Loaner.

As I got into the Loaner, I had to adjust the seat. It struck me then just how much shorter I was than my previous self. I'd lost nearly a foot in height, judging from how far forward I'd had to move the seat, and I'd adjusted the mirrors so that I could better see, and glanced to Warden Chase as she got in.

"Make sure you buckle up." I said, nodding to her.

"Right." Warden Chase quickly did so and I started the car.

"So, Warden Chase…" I commented as I pulled out of the parking lot. "I suppose I should thank you for the clothing. I'm not sure how I would have handled getting it on my own."

"Oh it was no big, Warden Dresden. I couldn't let you be falling out of your clothes in this weather…" Chase played down her involvement and I turned onto the street. I'd have to be careful when going about this, as if I was wrong, things could end poorly.

"I'm pretty impressed that you managed to get clothes that fit me so well. I'm not even sure how women's sizing works." God, that was awkward. Clothing wasn't really what I wanted to talk to her about, but segueing into Sunnydale directly wasn't really the best thing right off the bat.

"Oh, it's pretty simple. I can show you later if you want…" Warden Chase's offer sounded genuine. "You're not even a difficult size to shop for with how petite you are."

Petite. Small. Words I had never really associated with myself before today. I'd always been the tallest person in the room, taller even than my brother. While clearly I was still taller than Butters, Warden Chase had a few inches on me, visible even here in the car. Cordelia had been taller than Willow too.

"So, Warden Chase, what made you decide to become a Warden?" This would be a good start.

"Well… I suppose it has a lot to do with my mentor." Warden Chase started to speak, and then she raised a hand, forestalling my question. "Wizard Stewart Leonard Head, he taught me most of what I know about magic. I'd still be learning from him if it were up to me."

"What happened?" I asked. She was opening up to me.

"Lenny… he was like a father to me. He'd taught me so much about magic, how it can be helpful, how we can always keep learning more. He believed that the purpose of magic was for the pursuit of knowledge, and his teachings helped with my control. That all changed after Archangel."

Archangel… It had been a fortress where one of the Senior Council members had set up shop. Simon Pietrovich had been the Council member that was our vampire expert. He had also died a few years ago as someone had opened the very gates of Archangel to allow the Red Court in. It had been an inside job, without a doubt, but proving that was difficult. It was far easier to find someone to scapegoat, and for far too long, the Council's scapegoat had been me. I might not have been the one to let the vampires in, but it was my decisions that started the war with the Red Court in the first place. If I had to do it all again? I would make the same damn decision.

I nodded, encouraging Chase to go on while I kept my eyes on the road. This wasn't quite what I'd intended on getting from her, but this was definitely a start.

"After Pietrovich's death, Lenny became harder.. more distant. He'd reconnected with his mentor, Donald Morgan, and whenever the Wardens would go out on vampire hunts, he'd be right there with them. Lenny hadn't been a Warden for fifty years. He'd hated tracking down warlocks. He'd told me so. I'd… Well, he went off, a few months ago to defend some fortress…" Chase closed her eyes. "I'd asked him not to go, told him what I saw… But he went anyway. He might be the reason that Ramirez and Yoshimo made it out alive. Sacrificing himself. Damn Reds."

I breathed out a sigh, and focused on driving for a bit. Warden Chase… She had her own regrets, her own feelings of failing, but I still needed to push, and I'd have to push harder. I hated doing this to anyone who'd suffered a loss like that.

"I'm sorry, Cordelia." I hedged a bet.

"Sorry for what, Dresden?" Warden Chase sharply bit out. "For starting the war? For his death? For not beating Ortega in that duel? Well, I've got news for you, Harry Dresden, his death was one person's fault, his own. He didn't listen, and he paid the price for it. As for the war? From what I understand, the Reds were going to be starting a war _very_ soon, with or without you as a catalyst, and I believe I heard that Duke Ortega cheated in his attempts to duel you."

Well, it was good to hear that at least one Council member had a decent opinion of me, even if she wasn't on the Senior Council. She also didn't deny her name.

"You're right…" I said with a sigh. "But that doesn't absolve my feelings of guilt. How long has it been since you were last in Sunnydale?"

The time for subtlety had passed. While I'd found out something interesting about her, I needed to know if she had anything to do with what had happened. The way Cordelia had looked in Sunnydale was too alike to Warden Chase to be coincidence.

She let out a sound that had to be between a laugh and a sob. "Sunnydale? You're asking about Sunnydale now?"

"Yes." I said simply. "Sunnydale, Cordelia, how long?"

She laughed again, a little less forced this time. "I guess I should have known when I saw the look on your face when you declared Burger King was where we're eating. That was way too similar to the Resolve Face to be coincidence. Eleven years. The first three I was in Los Angeles, and then after LA, I was in South Wales. On this Earth. Wondering why a woman named Charisma Carpenter got the part to play _me_ in a TV series."

"She did a good job…" I started to say, only to be cut off.

"No way am I that bitchy…" Cordelia said and then looked at me. "And Willow's size too… Why did that happen I wonder…"

"When I passed out here, I found myself standing in Sunnydale in Willow's body. I think it had something to do with the activities going on over there." I said. "Halloween in Sunnydale was an interesting event."

"Oh, it must have been that Ethan Rayne spell…" Cordelia paused for a second. "But clearly, something was off. Willow dressed as a ghost, not as a Wizard."

"Well, she clearly dressed as me from my memory, and Buffy dressed as Shiro Yoshimo. Which is strange because the man has been dead for a few years at this point." I pointed out, but it seemed that both Cordelia and I came to the same conclusion.

"Different realities." Cordelia and I said simultaneously, and then she continued, "You ended up in some reality where Willow dressed as you for Halloween, while I came from one where she didn't. Additionally, it's probably possible since our lives are fictional here, your own might be the same on another version of Earth."

"The question is more of the how than the where at this point." I said, pondering. If Cordelia were from a different version of the Earth I went to, she was really uninvolved with my transformation, but it did explain why she knew my sizes. I didn't really think that I was any bigger than Willow had been. Willow wasn't a small woman by any means, but I've always been a tall person in general, and the sheer difference in height was jarring.

"Well, the how's pretty obviously some sort of black magic. Listens-to-Wind is probably your best bet at returning to normal. We can just catch the person or people responsible." Cordelia said. "In the meantime, I can make sure you don't commit any faux pas with your fashion. It's the least I owe-"

Magic built up in the car as Cordelia's eyes suddenly rolled up and she leaned forward clutching her head. She let out a cry of pain as she rocked back and forth. I couldn't… I didn't know what was happening here, but it looked like some sort of psychic attack. I pulled over on the side of the road. Butters would beat us to Burger King; I needed to deal with this now.

"Cordelia, Warden Chase, are you okay?" I asked, but she kept rocking back and forth, her pained cries echoing in my ears.

"Blonde woman… alleyway… Fourth and Main…" Cordelia forced out. "She's being chased… I can't see by what… She's scared. Very scared."

"Wh-what's going on?" I didn't like what I was hearing. Someone in trouble… and I could feel the charge in the air, though the Loaner was powering through it. Cordelia cried out one more time before sitting up in her seat.

"Warden Dresden… We need to get to Fourth and Main, now." Warden Chase said, panting a bit. It looked like she needed to catch her breath after that… whatever it was.

"What was that? Why do we need to get there?" I asked, though I was putting the car in drive already. Whatever had happened was over, but she'd mentioned something during it.

"Vision, well, more loud technicolor drill driven into my brain… I'll be fine, don't worry." Cordelia stated, her voice returning to a more normal tone. "As for the why? Doing what Lenny and my old boss always thought should be done. We're helping the helpless."

Visions. Great. I couldn't deny that something had happened with Cordelia, and I needed to verify it. As my stomach growled in protest, I frowned. As much as I hated to do this, Burger King would have to wait. Someone needed help, and we were the best equipped to go do it.

I still really wanted my Whopper though.

* * *

Luckily, we really weren't all that far away from where Cordelia claimed her vision had taken place. Visions were a bit of a new territory for me, but I knew that some wizards had a form of foresight. It occasionally would creep in and give bouts of insight about situations and areas of importance, but I had never heard of foresight leading to full-blown visions, at least not the way that Cordelia had quite obviously been afflicted. I also had yet to experience any sort of foresight myself, so all I knew about that was highly theoretical and had been mentioned by my first teacher in an afternoon that I had been more interested in paying attention to Elaine than him. Probably.

Still, as we drove up Main Street and parked near a meter, I could feel the hair on the back of my arms start to raise up. Something had caused Cordelia to see what she'd seen, and assuming her vision was accurate, any minute now we would see the blonde she mentioned. We exited the jeep, and I grabbed my duster, making sure to pin it up higher to compensate for my currently vertically challenged status. I popped the trunk, and both Cordelia and I grabbed our staffs.

"It's good to be the one actually acting on my visions, for once." Cordelia commented.

"You haven't before?" I asked, raising an eyebrow, something that was surprisingly easy to do now. Not that I couldn't before, but it took a little bit more effort. I resisted the temptation to try both sides in favor of looking down the street.

"No, back in LA, it had always been Angel, Wesley or Gunn who went out when I had visions." Cordelia commented, checking over her own gear, pulling out several knives and slipping them up her sleeves. "While I did learn to fight later on, I never had the strength that they did. Now I don't need it."

From what I knew about Angel, he probably would never willingly let a woman get in harm's way if he could prevent it. I can't say that I disagreed with the sentiment, but I knew that if a woman _wanted_ to do something hard enough, it was quite often best to just let her. Murphy proved that, and despite my objections to her getting involved in all of this supernatural crap, she managed to hold her own. Cordelia had advantages that Murph didn't.

"I don't know Wesley or Gunn, but I met Angel. Good man, or at least he tries to be." I closed the back of the jeep and started toward the alley.

"Yeah, he is…" Cordelia said, her stride locking step with my own. Her gait was a bit further than mine as she was a forehead taller than me, but I was able to keep pace. My hand dipped into the pocket of my duster, where my revolver rested, and I frowned. It probably wasn't the best of ideas to use it. For one, this was the middle of the day, despite the cloud cover, and the other reason was that judging from my new wrists, I might break one by firing it. I'd had to twist my shield bracelet some so it wouldn't just slip off of my hand.

"So, this is where your vision took place then?" I asked as we finally reached the alley's entrance. It seemed like it fit the stereotype, an area out of direct sight of the street that hid most of the offal from local businesses, including trash. This time of day, there weren't any homeless lying about, and given the snowy weather, they probably wouldn't hang out in alleys this time of year.

"Yes, and she should be coming any…" Cordelia paused as a familiar blonde walked swiftly past us, trying hard not to look like she was moving away from something. I recognized her; I'd met her outside the Sheraton hotel after looking at Lisa Hendricks and her beau, memories I probably would wish to forget. I looked toward the direction she was coming from, just as the blonde ducked into the alleyway. The speed she had been walking could only barely be called that, given her glances over her shoulder as she passed. Cordelia continued a few seconds after she'd passed us. "…minute now… Okay, well, there she is… I wonder what she was running from."

Cordelia continued to gaze down the alley after her, but I followed the blonde's path with my eyes. "Oh, I'd say she was running from something big, maybe a story and a half tall. Arms about as thick as an ogre's on one side and built like a tree trunk on the other. Something with sharp nasty teeth that were as mismatched as its face, along with a glowing red eye and a clearly ogreish one."

Cordelia turned to me with a frown. "That's… oddly specific. How do you know that's what she's running from?"

My initial answer was cut-off by a dual-toned roar, heavily bass like a lion but also high-pitched enough to sound like the screech from one of those velociraptors in Jurassic Park. I nodded toward the source of the roar and answered Cordelia, "Women's intuition."

"You haven't even been a woman for a full…" Cordelia started to berate me as she turned toward the creature. Whatever it was, the description I gave to Cordelia was accurate, even if it didn't account for the halved spines on one side of its back that flared up with the roar, nor its digitigrade right leg and trunk-like left. It was as if a plant monster and an ogre had a bastard child and it was hunting. Excuse me. It was as if a chlorofiend and an ogre had a bastard child. Plant monster is such a juvenile way of describing things, and something this schizophrenic in shape deserved its own name.

"Great, it's a schizofiend." Aren't I clever? I reached into my coat to grab at my blasting rod, just as the schizofiend reached down with its meaty hand and grabbed a car.

"That's not a thing, Dresden!" Cordelia shouted as she leveled her staff. I hadn't taken a close look at it when she'd put it into the trunk of the jeep, but it seemed to be made of a dark wood, with runic designs running up it. At the top was a crystalline sphere that currently glowed an aquamarine light, clearly indicating her magic running through it.

"It's totally a thing." I commented as the schizofiend lifted the car off the ground with another dual-toned roar and threw it at us. Simultaneously with Cordelia, I leveled my own staff, and the runes on my staff began glowing red and emitting a sulfuric tainted wood smoke. " _Forzare!_ "

Though Cordelia's incantation came alongside mine, I could clearly make it out. " _Gorfodi i ffwrdd_ _!_ "

Twin waves of force erupted from our staffs and slammed into the car, driving down the street toward the schizofiend who batted it away like a dodgeball. With another roar, it charged us.

"Scatter!" I yelled and ran toward the schizofiend. Clearly, given the direction of the street, this was the only option. I needed to get the attention of it off of Cordelia and the blonde. While she could handle herself, I was the senior Warden here.

"That's so not scattering, Dresden!" Cordelia called after me, but I ignored her. My mind raced as I ran at the schizofiend. The only way this thing could have been out and about during the day like this had to be because of the cloud cover. With the sky threatening snow like it had been for the past few weeks, most things that would normally be weakened during the day could handle being outside. This thing looked like an amalgam of both Courts of Faerie, the plants clearly from Summer, with the ogre parts from Winter, and it had to be tearing itself up inside. Of course, it wanted to tear me up instead, and I ducked its claws.

If I'd been my old height, that would have caught me hard on the shoulder, I leaned back to slide on the ice while pulling out my blasting rod. The tip glowed a bright red, almost turning white-hot as I slid, baseball style through the schizofiend's legs. I pointed the blasting rod upward and shouted, " _Fuego_!"

Fire lanced out from the rod toward where the legs joined at its torso. Clearly whatever made it hadn't given it such a weakness as to give it genitalia, but I couldn't help but wince sympathetically when it came alight. Dropping to a knee, the schizofiend's trunk-like hand came at me.

I caught the brunt on my duster, but I was lighter now; I flew across the street, over a car. I drove my staff down to try and redirect my momentum, and nearly got whiplash as I pulled. I lost grip on my staff and fell in a snow drift.

I reached over toward my staff, about to mutter a spell that I commonly used to retrieve it when as I willed it, the staff simply floated into my hand. I hadn't had much time to ponder that as my instincts immediately had me roll left, out of the way of a meaty fist slamming where I would have been. Leveling my staff, I felt the Hellfire channel through me and the runes in my staff smoked.

"No more Mister Nice Wizard. _Forzare!_ " The Hellfire charged force struck the schizofiend point blank, pushing it off its massive feet and through the wall of the building… which appeared to be some sort of storage with a chemistry set in the corner. The building looked mostly abandoned from the inside, and a chute of some sort went up from the chemistry set toward the roof. I couldn't tell exactly what was over there… well, except for the schizofiend. It had knocked some of the chemicals over, some splashing on it. I'm lucky that it fixated upon me; there was no intelligence in those eyes. Something had to have been controlling it, but no more. Swapping my staff to my left hand, I swung my blasting rod into my right and channeled as much heat as I could into it, pulling from the wood, the floor, and even myself. " _Pyrofuego!_ "

The lance of flame coming from my blasting rod shone like the sun. Looking back, perhaps I should have paid better attention to the chemicals that I had knocked the schizofiend into. Upon striking true, my spell lit up the wooden parts of the creature like a Christmas tree, and it kept going. You know that feeling you get when you have done something really stupid? Time seemed to slow down as the flames spread, and I saw the shockwave before I heard it. The force preceding the actual explosion knocked me off my feet, and I barely had enough time to get my shield up before the flames followed. I'd been burned before, but my new shield bracelet was better. My new _shield_ was better, and I couldn't even feel the heat of the flames, but I also couldn't move.

"Dŵr, diffoddwch!" Cordelia's voice rang out over the sounds of licking flames, and a path appeared for her as water rushed from the sprinkler system and brushed away the flames. She came up to me and glared. "Dresden, drop the shield… I'll get you out of here!"

Following her orders, I did so, and she lifted me into a fireman's carry. I thought about protesting. I was able to walk, but Cordelia seemed determined, and I kept an eye out for the schizofiend as I looked back. I watched a meaty arm reach up out of the flames only to be consumed by them and collapse in on itself. Once again, fire ruled the day. Fire was the great purifier, after all, and it was useful against most supernatural things, including things of the Nevernever like whatever that had actually been. Schizofiend was a good name though.

"What the _hell_ was that, Dresden?" I wasn't entirely sure if Cordelia was asking or just yelling at me. I leaned toward the former.

"Schizofiend, bastard child of an ogre and a chlorofiend." I answered and looked around before Cordelia put me down. Ah, there she was. The blonde we showed up here to save was safe and sound.

"Okay, A. That's totally _not_ a thing, and B, that's so not what I was talking about Dresden." Cordelia scolded. "Why'd you just leave me behind?"

"One, clearly it's not a thing anymore, because I killed it, and Two, because you were there to guard the person who was in danger." I prided myself on my answer there. It was even mostly true. "As ranking Warden, it was my decision to place you where you would be most effective given what I know of your skills."

I shivered, the wind was starting to pick up, and so was the snow. Maybe I should have bundled a bit tighter, but I couldn't affect that now, so I simply pulled my duster closed around me.

"Oh…" Cordelia trailed off. "I still don't like being left behind…"

"Wouldn't expect you to, but know I only did it because I trusted you to take care of her." I nodded at the blonde, and then breathed out sharply. My breath fogged on the air, and the snow continued to get thicker, but focused only in the area around us. "Speaking of taking care of, Miss, please get between us…"

The blonde nodded and moved, but she had a look of mild confusion on her face as she looked at me. She probably just didn't understand why I was going through with this precaution.

"Dresden, what is it?" Cordelia asked as she gripped her staff a bit tighter and looked around.

"We're going to want to get to the jeep and soon." I said, looking at the other two women. They were lucky enough to not see what I clearly saw, but they deserved to know. "Winter is coming."

"No, Mortal," a cold but beautiful voice came from just down the street. Her voice carried on the wind. "Winter is here."

* * *

Author's Notes:

Well, look how far we've gotten. This is the first set of notes I'm writing for this fic. The reason that the update schedule has been what it's been for the past week and a half is that I had all of that already written. I'm still working on the fic, but the next bits are going to come slower as I release two to three scenes per chapter. Harry's in quite a predicament, isn't she? He? Well, let's get into gender identity at a later time, shall we? Thank you for all the reviews and support so far. I hope to finish this fic this year.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter Ten

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Disclaimer: I own nothing here. See First Chapter for full disclaimer

* * *

Hell's Bells… Mab. Better known as Mab, Queen of Air and Darkness, Queen of the Winter Court of the Sidhe, and all-around someone that you simply do not want to mess with. Imagine, if you will all of those tales of dark, evil queens, of beautiful yet deadly sirens, of wicked witches, hungry ogresses, she-beasts, then consider that at some point, in some way, all of them were real. Mab outclassed all of them. I wouldn't be surprised if she gave them lessons and a test on how to be evil.

It wasn't that Mab was ugly, far from it, really. As she stepped closer to our group, the clouds seemed to part just enough that the sun could shine down upon her, illuminating her beauty. Before now, I hadn't noticed just how tall Mab was, as she'd always been shorter than me at just a hair under six feet. Her snow-white hair flowed down to the small of her back, and it was tied back with a band of ice. She wore a blue dress that seemed to sparkle like ice crystals in the sunlight as it struck her, giving her a form of ethereal beauty. It was her eyes, however, that betrayed her inhuman nature, an emerald green with slit pupils that seemed to be a common trait of the sidhe, and they contrasted nicely with her lips colored like frozen mulberries.

Yes, Mab was beautiful, striking, and frankly, somewhat evil, but she had a purpose. I wasn't entirely certain what that purpose was, but both the Courts had a purpose.

And I owed her two favors. Stars and Stones, I hoped she wasn't going to ask for one on top of everything else.

"Wizard Dresden, relax thy guard, for I do not come seeking conflict." Mab's voice carried melodically on the wind, her words a chilling addition to the already cold breeze. Clearly she already recognized me, which honestly didn't surprise me as much as it could have. Mab likely didn't see how the average mortal saw, so she probably recognized me through whatever form of vision she uses to identify those whom she has a contract or contractual obligation with.

"Queen Mab, I doubt I could do much more than try to run away if you were seeking conflict." I lowered my staff to the ground, looking up toward the Fae Queen's eyes. Sidhe weren't like humans; I didn't have to worry about soulgazing them if I locked eyes with one of them. Instead, I had to worry about fairy glamours and other possible fun things that she could do to me if she felt so inclined.

Mab let out a laugh. "Wizard, we both know that you, of all people, would not run away. The proof is in the building over there."

"The schizofiend? Yeah, now it's roasting…" I started, and then I continued, ignoring Cordelia's protest to the name, "Mab, why have you come here?"

"Schizofiend, creative name, wizard." Mab's lips quirked into an approximation of a smile that added a layer of snow to Hell after saying that. "Two favors I am yet owed by thee, child. Two favors, but I have not come to collect upon them this day. Nay, instead I am here in fulfillment of the duty of a queen to her vassal."

This had happened before, not even two months ago, Mab had appeared to me while I was working the case that got me drafted as a Warden. She had provided help that while not invaluable, had not been entirely unhelpful. Admittedly, I hadn't been trying to seek her out on purpose. I had instead been trying to summon…

"Lea is still incapacitated?" I asked. Lea was my fairy godmother. No, it wasn't exactly like it sounded. Lea is short for the Leanansidhe. Folklore paints her as a muse but also someone who drives people crazy while knowing her. Having met my godmother, I'd say folklore only had it half right. I had been attempting to summon her for some help with figuring out how to deal with the Heirs of Kemmler, but instead Mab showed up.

"It is no swift task to allow her recovery from her affliction." Mab stated calmly. "As such, I would be remiss in my duties as queen if I allowed her own duties as your godmother to be ignored. While I can not offer you the same help that she would in this situation, I can offer a restoration, Wizard."

"A restoration?" I asked, not even daring to hope, given the situation. Besides which, this was Mab, and nothing with faeries came for free. "And what would I give you in exchange for such a generous offer?"

There it was again, the faint hint of a smile. "Along with your debt, I will restore your form to its more masculine proportions if you accept the mantle of Knight."

I won't deny that I was tempted. This would have been the easiest way to return to my normal self, but that was the keyword there. Easy. It was too easy. Additionally, though my debt would be fulfilled, I would be the Winter Knight. I would be working for the Winter Court as their hitman. Their trigger puller. It went against everything I believed in. Besides, I wouldn't be getting out from under faerie thumbs, I would be getting under a genuine bigger one.

"As… nice as the offer is, Queen Mab, I must decline." I remembered Lloyd Slate, and how he had acted. I couldn't let that happen. Under no circumstances was I going to accept becoming the Winter Knight. I'd have to find another way. "If there's nothing else…"

Mab stepped closer to me and placed a hand on my shoulder. "The path ahead of thee, wizard, will not be easy. Tread carefully, lest you succumb to the temptation whispered in thy ear. I would hate to think I misjudged thee, child."

Her eyes flicked to Cordelia and the blonde who stood between us, and she switched to a genuine smile. Somehow that scared me even more than the quirking of her lips. "I have not forgotten thee, Seer. Thy silence betrays thy knowledge. You do deserve to be counted among the Wise."

Cordelia offered some sort of bow and curtsy thing without saying anything, and the blonde just stared in silence as she was dismissed from the notice of Mab. I chose not to bring up names, for Mab knew my own well enough.

"Mab, what was the schizofiend?" I decided to ask the question. Perhaps I would get a straight answer, but I doubted it.

"An abomination whose creation is an affront to what should be." Mab said sharply.

"So it was fey."

"In the way that vodka is water." Mab squeezed my shoulder slightly and I shifted my weight. I didn't want to be where I was at the moment.

"Do you know what caused me to change?" I had to ask. Mab was offering to change me back if I became Winter Knight, but that didn't mean she knew what had happened.

"Yes." A one-word answer was surprising. I was expecting her to draw it out a bit longer, perhaps some misdirection.

"Will you tell me?" Faeries, especially sidhe, are very bound by the literal words that they use. As such, they tend to honor agreements with mortals by interpreting those literal words.

"You have the resources and capabilities to figure it out on your own, Wizard. You simply need some faith." Mab squeezed my shoulder again and walked off into the falling snow, disappearing from sight after a few steps. She probably returned to the Nevernever.

She'd had some purpose here that I missed in that conversation. I couldn't be entirely sure what it was, but there were more layers to that conversation than I thought.

Shaking my head, I turned back to Cordelia and the blonde. "I'm… sorry that happened. Mab's a scary being."

"Whom you owe two favors to. Dresden, how do you owe two favors to the Queen Scary?" Cordelia asked.

"I was young, stupid and in danger." I retorted, and then I turned toward the blonde. "So, you were on the run from the schizofiend… what's your name?"

The blonde ran a finger over something under her gloved hands, but I couldn't tell what. She then spoke, holding off on the stuttering some this time. "C-call me Tara."

* * *

She'd said to call her Tara, not that her name was Tara, and that was an important distinction. It proved that Tara knew enough about the supernatural that she knew something about Names, or at least she knew that giving her true name to a Wizard, or any magic user, really, could do something. Such knowledge wasn't entirely inaccurate, either. Names are important.

Everything has a Name, from the lowliest mortal to the most absurd thing in the Nevernever. To know someone or something's name gives you power over it or them. Strange, isn't it? That something so innocuous as your name could give someone such power over you?

It's a bit more complicated than that. A Wizard, or really any supernatural being, can only take advantage of your True Name. Mortals change all the time, and are a bit more malleable with their identities. Additionally, the True Name needs to be pronounced correctly, how you would pronounce it. An example would be how certain syllables are stressed in Jackie. Subtle variations in the pronunciation can imply different things. But give a Wizard or other supernatural being your full name and how you pronounce it from your own mouth, and you give that being power over you. Names can be used in any number of spells or ways to allow the effects to target you, and only you by creating a sympathetic link between you and the spell.

So, of course, I had no real issue with Tara using that as her name. Whether it actually was her name or not didn't matter given the situation she'd found herself in. The schizofiend had been chasing her for a reason.

"Okay, Tara," I started off. No need to alienate the girl right off the bat. Which… unfortunately meant giving my own name would be rather tricky due to the current situation. Maybe she'd buy it though. She did just get attacked by a mutant faerie, and Mab gave my last name out pretty blatantly while she was here. Still, I did have a nice way around giving my given name, and it even actually applied in this situation. "I'm Warden Dresden and this is Warden Chase, we're working with the police."

"D-dresden? Like Harry Dresden?" Tara asked, and Cordelia gave me a meaningful look. What it specifically meant I couldn't tell, but it was almost like she was trying to tell me something.

"You could say that." I responded. While I could mention that I actually was Harry Dresden, this really didn't seem like the time or place to go into details about my transformation. "Could you tell us what happened before we got here?"

Cordelia took a spot next to Tara, to offer some sort of comfort, I thought. Maybe she'd be able to let the blonde feel more at ease. I hated these sorts of interviews, especially after dealing with a monster attack. Speaking of monster attacks, my eyes flit down the street toward the building that I fought the schizofiend in; the flames had spread, starting to climb the walls. In the distance, I could hear the telltale signs of the fire department. The building had a fire break between it and the other buildings, and snow had piled up there. It wouldn't take anything else out besides itself.

Tara licked her lips and looked at me before answering. "I was… I w-was l-looking for s-s-some things about Lisa… I f-found.. I didn't see anything… before it started after me… honest."

This was the woman whom I had bumped into and was waiting outside of the hotel. If she had been Lisa Hendricks's friend, then she had deserved to know what happened. The question is, what more did she have on the victim than… Well, never mind, if she were the victim's friend, she'd have quite a bit more. I had next to no knowledge of her beyond the fact that she was related to Cujo, Marcone's bodyguard.

"Lisa… you're friends with Lisa Hendricks?" I asked. I didn't know if the cops had spoken to her yet, but in this particular instance, I was acting simultaneously as PI and Warden. Cordelia seemed to be observing my questioning style. "I'm… sorry for your loss."

Tara nodded, licked her lips and continued, only the slightest hint of tears coming to her face. "T-thank you… Lisa, yeah, she was a good friend…. Almost like a sister to me. She was studying law at Northwestern, but she still made the time to see me and… we talked."

"Oh, about?" I asked.

"The usual stuff, I guess. S-she was always complaining that despite l-living in the same city as him, she didn't get to see her brother all that often. He works a lot, some sort of bouncer gig, I think. It pays well, but it k-keeps him busy." Tara said, and I nodded. Bouncer sounded like a good cover for what Cujo really did with Marcone, and I wasn't going to disrespect the dead by telling Tara the truth about that.

"Did she mention a boyfriend? In your talks, I mean." I needed her to trust me some more. I wasn't entirely sure I could get her to do it. It's kind of hard to do the tall, reassuring man thing when you're not quite as tall and have a more feminine form. I mean, Cordelia had maybe a hand on me in height now.

"O-oh, y-yeah… Larry…" Tara said, her pink tongue coming out to wet her lips once more. It was cold; perhaps I should have offered her some chap stick, if I'd had any. "L-larry was her boyfriend from Undergrad, and h-he'd become a banker."

Banker. Lawyer. Well, not even lawyer yet, but sister of a mobster's enforcer is what Lisa Hendricks was. She just didn't know it, or at least she didn't know enough to tell Tara, but what if I had been coming at this the wrong way? What if Lisa hadn't been the actual target of this?

"What bank?" I asked.

"W-windy C-city International…" Tara said, looking away from me for a second, her face ducking down. I got a glimpse of her eyes, but looked toward those red lips again after a couple seconds so to not trigger a soulgaze. "H-he worked there… And… t-that's…"

"That's where you say you didn't see anything." I finished for her. I held out hope that she wouldn't go after a line as blatant as that one, so I asked, "So, what is it you didn't see?"

"I…" Tara clenched her hands, and Cordelia gave her shoulder a reassuring squeeze. "It… T-they had done s-something… they'd taken a key… And they w-went into the safety deposit room. The k-key had… s-something with it, but I couldn't see."

"So, they were going into the safety deposit room, and then what? What had you running like this?" I asked, trying to keep my voice level.

"N-no, I c-couldn't have s-seen it... H-he and… glowing… four eyes… then…" Tara closed her eyes and suddenly came forward, burying her face into my shoulder. "I'm not crazy… I'm not… She can't… I'm not crazy… I'm me…"

"Tara?" I asked, gently. "Sweetie, what did you see?"

"F-fingers…. Into his head… Blonde hair…" I looked over to Cordelia, whose tan seemed to be draining out of her face. "… She's… dead… She's supposed to be dead..."

"Who is?" I asked, and Tara pulled away from my shoulder to lock eyes with me for a second before I looked away.

"Glorificus."

* * *

While I didn't exactly recognize the name Glorificus, clearly Cordelia had and it had her eying Tara warily. Whoever this Glorificus was, she obviously was some sort of bad news, and possibly from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Hell's Bells, that meant that Tara was as well if Cordelia recognized the name. I'd have to ask her about it when we were on the road again, but just the reactions that it drew from both of them had me nervous as well.

I breathed out a sigh. "Tara, we'll handle this, trust me."

She looked to my face again and nodded. Shakily, she said, "B-but… Glory is…" Oh, that was much easier to say than Glorificus, and I could make a few jokes about it later. "Glory is… she's strong…"

"I've dealt with strong people before, and Cor- Warden Chase isn't any slouch either," I said.

"Thanks, Dresden." Cordelia managed to work some sarcasm into that statement. "But we will handle this, Tara. There's three more Wardens in town, and I'm sure we can get some more help if necessary."

Tara nodded and hugged me close again. This time, I could practically feel the gratitude coming off of her, and she smelled a bit like raspberries. Cordelia shot me a look and I patted Tara's back in response.

"Tara… do you have a safe place to stay?" I asked softening my tone a bit more. I wasn't going to offer that she should stay at my place or anything crazy like that. With Thomas living with me, I didn't really want to deal with any of the Wardens coming by and finding out that a White Court vampire was staying with me. No, given the beings that had been attacking her, there was one place I knew would likely be safe.

"No… I d-don't…" Tara breathed in through her nose and out a sigh. "Not a safe place…"

I nodded, expecting that. "I know of a place that will be safe enough. St. Mary of the Angels Catholic Church. Father Forthill is a friend, and he is clued in."

I'd sent Forthill people before for him to keep safe, and I just needed to keep Tara as safe as I could while we investigated this further. I didn't want her to be bait or a lightning rod for whatever we ended up running into beyond this point, and I did want her in an accessible area to discuss this Glory being more. Thomas might also be an invaluable resource. Additionally, Tara's description of glowing eyes… Glory was working with a Denarian. Probably, anyway… Given my encounter with Ursiel in Sunnydale, it wasn't all that surprising that they might show up. However, whatever this was didn't seem to be Nicodemus's style. I was missing too many pieces of the puzzle, and worse, I was hungrier than when we left Butters's place.

Tara nodded. "I c-can get there."

"No need," Cordelia said. "We're parked about a block from here. Dresden can take you by the church before we go to where we need to next."

"R-really?" Tara looked at me, eagerly hopeful, and I nodded.

"It's not very far out of the way. It's not any trouble." I answered, and I was rewarded with a gorgeous smile. "You'll uh, have to let go of me first though…"

Tara blushed and nodded. It was a cute blush, and I made a mental note that I might want to try to get it out again. She let go, and I started to lead the two girls back to the Loaner. Luckily enough, the Jeep had managed to avoid becoming a target in the fight, and we remained unmolested when we got in. Cordelia and I put our staffs in the back, and Tara climbed into the passenger seat, buckling in.

The ride to St. Mary's was a bit of a quiet one, as I focused primarily on driving there in the increasingly snowy conditions, but Cordelia made some small talk with Tara along the way, quietly, of course. As we pulled into the parking lot at St. Mary's we got a bit of a lull in the snow, and it looked like the lot had been freshly plowed. The lot had a few cars in it, and I pulled up closer to the rectory entrance that I had entered two days before.

"Well, here we are…" I commented, attempting to keep my voice in a somewhat civil tone, but my hunger put in a bit of a bite.

"I'll walk you up, Tara." Cordelia commented. "We'll let Father Forthill know that Dresden recommended him."

"O-okay…" She reached over to my hand with her gloved one, and she gave it a squeeze. "You'll be coming back, right?"

"Promise." I said, simply. "I might need to ask you some more questions when you're ready too, Tara."

The blonde nodded and squeezed my hand again before letting go. She opened the door, and, along with Cordelia, she stepped outside. The pair headed toward the rectory entrance, and I breathed out a sigh as my stomach growled. Saving Tara from the schizofiend was a good thing, and it had managed to net us some potentially valuable information about those that killed Lisa Hendricks and "Larry." However, it did mean that I still hadn't managed to get my Burger King, and I was _hungry_ , damn it.

"She's under your spell, how else could it be, her flirting with you so easily?" Lasciel's dulcet tones came out almost in a teasing manner as she faded into my vision in the passenger seat. "My host, you really do find yourself in the oddest of predicaments."

I pursed my lips. On the one hand, the shade's presence meant that I didn't leave her back with Willow, not endangering the redhead nor tempting her into calling the coin that currently was under several tons of cement.

"Lasciel, what are you even talking about?" I asked, almost knowing what the Fallen's shadow would probably offer, and in fact, I second guessed it. "If it's to offer me a way to turn back to normal by taking up the coin, you can forget it."

The shade laughed. "I _like_ the female form, my host, and it is quite obvious that your rescued potential victim enjoys it as well. While it ultimately does not matter the gender of the holder of the coin, that you are now a woman in body is pleasing in some ways. Yes, taking up the coin could allow you to change back, assuming you wanted to, but from what I've seen of you, you may just find a way back on your own."

"So, if not that sort of offer, then what?" I looked out the window, Tara and Cordelia were knocking at the door. To the rectory, and they waited.

"My host, I merely wish to see you happy," the shade said. "That girl could help with that, and she certainly wishes to. It looked like she was working up courage to do something more than hold your hand for a little while."

"You're crazy." I frowned, but then I watched the door open. Cordelia stepped inside the rectory, and Tara started pulling off her gloves before going inside. I noticed a flash of something pink on her fingers , but at the distance we were at, I couldn't make it out. After they headed inside, the door shut behind them, so once again, I looked at an empty lot.

"My host, you are talking to someone who resides in your subconscious mind." Lasciel simply commented. "So I must ask, how may I serve your needs?

"I'm probably going to be asking this of every source. What do you know about Glorificus?" It couldn't hurt to ask the fallen angel that knew nearly everything if she knew about this one thing.

"While there are a great many things that I do know, my host, I do not know much about beings from a fictional universe." Lasciel answered. Of course, she could lie with the best of them; she'd been around since the dawn of time. "Up until your excursion as Miss Rosenberg, I would not even have thought of that particular universe as a potential for going to. Especially in that fashion."

"So what you're saying is that it was a new experience for you." I surmised. "Did you even know it was there?"

"Of course I did, my host. However, alternate timelines and alternate universes, though connected by the Nevernever, are not things that even an angel would often consider going to, let alone in the manner you did so. Glorificus, judging from both this 'Tara' and Cordelia's reactions…. Is dangerous, but it is unlikely that she would be able to deal with you if you were to take up the coin."

Ah, there it was. The suggestion wasn't entirely unexpected. Lasciel's shade's job was to get me to take up Lasciel's coin, but it wasn't going to work. Not this time, at least.

"I'll deal with her my own way." I said, but then my attention was drawn to the church doors as they opened sharply, and a very different blonde stepped out, taller than Tara had been, maybe an inch or two under six feet. She was fair-skinned, blue-eyed, and built like the proverbial brick house. She somehow combined strength, grace, and beauty that showed through, well, everything, not just her appearance.

It took me a second, but I recognized her. The last time I'd seen this girl, she had been changing out of her goth clothing into a more conservative outfit so as not to offend her mother's sensibilities. Now, her clothing choice ran somewhere in the middle of the road between them. Her jacket hugged her chest a little too tightly, and the jeans she wore fit snug against her. While I doubt her mother really appreciated what Molly had worn, at least it wasn't entirely inappropriate for wearing to Church.

Charity Carpenter stepped outside not long after Molly did, and the familial resemblance was uncanny. Charity's clothing, in contrast to her daughter was not only fitting for the weather, but it was also what you would expect a good Catholic mother to wear. She wore a winter coat overtop of what looked like a dark blouse and slacks that weren't too tight on her body, conservative clothing, of course. It was clear that she was following Molly down, and judging from the color of each woman's face, it looked like they were having an argument, and Molly left.

"Well, something has her angry." Lasciel commented, her own blonde hair now tied up with her toga. I turned to glare at the shadow of the Fallen.

"Why are you still here?" I asked.

"To offer my help, once more, my host." Lasciel said. "If you are going to insist on throwing yourself into danger once more and still refuse the coin, then I must simply offer all that I can."

While the copy of Lasciel claimed she didn't know anything about Glorificus, Lasciel herself was a being that had existed since the Dawn of Time, and the Angel had likely forgotten more about magic than I would ever learn in my lifetime. The problem was that Lasciel's shadow was like a drug dealer. The first one would be free, but each progressive one would be worse, until eventually she'd have me eagerly picking up the coin and giving up my free will to the Fallen inside it. I wouldn't allow that.

"Like Hell. You can go back to my mind and come out when I _ask_ for you to. If you can't follow that simple task, I'm going to have to lock you up in a small black box." I ground out. "A small black box with no holes in it."

Lasciel shook her head. "If you wish, my Host. But before I go, weren't there two women in the parking lot?"

I looked up and around. Charity Carpenter, though obviously angry had had some of the color drained from her face as she started looking around the lot. The soundproofing on my car must have been excellent because I couldn't hear anything she was yelling, but if I had to guess, she was calling out to Molly.

Molly had disappeared, seemingly into thin air. All that was left of her were some footprints upon the snow. I frowned. Would I have to rescue another blonde before I finally got my chance to eat? God knew I was hungry, and I wanted my burgers, damnit.

What else could go wrong?

* * *

Author's notes:

So you guys are more or less caught up to where I've written so far. I'm still working on this, don't worry. I'm hoping to put out about a chapter a week until it's done. Some weeks I won't quite hit that, but most weeks I'll do it.


	11. Chapter 11

Training Daze, A Crossover Fanfic of the Dresden Files

* * *

By Ellf  
Chapter Eleven

* * *

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the intellectual property found within this fanfic. All belong to their respective content creators. Dresden Files is authored by Jim Butcher, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a creation of Joss Whedon.

* * *

I can't say that I wasn't tempted to just go and head on off to Burger King, but call me a chauvinist, I never could leave a woman in trouble, even if said woman tended to severely dislike me. Honestly, I couldn't really blame Charity for her dislike of me either. Her husband, Michael, was one of the Knights of the Cross, wielder of _Amoracchius_ , the sword of love, and he was also someone whom I considered a close friend. We hadn't seen each other much in the past few years, primarily thanks to my mental companion, but I knew that if I approached Michael and asked him for help, he'd give it without question. He just was that kind of person. I'd asked him for help before, and he gave it to me back when the ghosts were getting a bit unruly in Chicago, back before Susan… Before the war with the Red Court started. He'd helped out then, but he'd been hurt because of me. This was something that Charity felt happened every time I would ask for Michael's help, or at least often enough that she had developed a disapproval of me. Still, Michael was my friend, and I was his so she would put up with me for her husband's sake if not my own. Heck, they even named their youngest after me. How cool is that? Of course, right now, I wasn't exactly looking like myself, and unless Butters put the call out to everyone who knew me, I doubted that Charity knew about my current bodily situation. Given how Molly had up and disappeared while Charity was looking for her, I could see the understandable worry on her face, something I no doubt had echoed on my own.

"My host, surely you aren't thinking of…." Lasciel trailed off and disappeared as I opened the door.

I muttered, partially to myself but mostly to her, "I'm going to help Charity find her daughter. And don't call me Shirley."

Momentarily, I paused. Shirley could be a legal name that I could use for this form if it came to that, but it didn't _feel_ right. I'm not sure that any name would feel right other than my own, but I sure as hell wasn't going to use "Harriet" Blackstone Copperfield Dresden as my name. The feminine version of my normal name just sounded wrong for me. I'd have to figure out a name I could find acceptable while still also using my own name when necessary.

Of course, now I had something more important to focus on. As I stepped out of the car, Charity locked her eyes on me, but I quickly darted my eyes toward her nose. I may have Soulgazed her husband, but I had not done the same to her. I approached the taller woman, Hells Bells, that was downright unsettling. Michael's wife had a good half a foot on me now, when the reverse had been true previously. Still, I needed to talk to her.

"Everything all right?" I asked, concern tinging my voice. I'm not sure exactly who I sounded like, but I definitely didn't sound like _me_.

Charity shook her head. "No… I'm looking for my daughter. I know she came out this way, but I can't seem to find her."

"And you don't want to go too far because you have your other children to worry about." I glanced past her toward the door of the church, which was cracked a bit. I could see young Daniel Carpenter's face peeking through the crack along with what looked like Hope. They'd gotten bigger since I'd last seen them but not by much.

"Yes…" Charity followed my gaze and while her worried expression faded ever so slightly, it still was enough to be noticeable on her face. "I can't really leave them to go find her. Not until my husband gets here, anyway."

Stars and Stones, Michael was on his way here? He might not have recognized me either, but I wasn't sure that I wanted to have that encounter and explanation now. Still, Molly had disappeared, and Charity needed help.

"How about this?" I asked, adopting what I'd hoped was a reassuring smile, "I'll look for Molly, and you go in and wait with your kids. I'll make sure she gets back to you safely."

Charity blinked and looked me over for a second. Confusion passed over her face. "Do I know you?"

Hell's Bells, I didn't mean to give myself away, but maybe I could spin this in my favor. "No? I mean, maybe I just have one of those faces."

Charity arched a blonde eyebrow at me as she looked me over once more, but then she looked to the Loaner. "You know my daughter's name, and I hadn't mentioned it to you. You aren't one of her friends from school; you're too old for that. Your jacket's also a bit too long for your body. Just what have you gotten yourself into, Mr. Dresden?"

I thought _I_ was supposed to be the investigator. "It's… complicated, Charity. Still, I can go find Molly. You stay with the kids."

Charity breathed out a sigh. She _really_ didn't like me, but that didn't mean she didn't trust me. "Fine, Mr. Dresden. Find her for me, please, and bring her back."

I nodded. "Promise."

Charity turned and walked back toward the church, presumably to head inside and wait with the rest of the Carpenter brood. Myself, I walked toward the last place I saw Molly before she disappeared. Looking around in the snow, I saw some fresh footprints heading away from the spot, leading around the Church toward the road. The size of the footprint was about the size I judged Molly and Charity's feet to be at, perhaps a size up from my own feet at the moment, and barring doing a little thaumaturgy that I really didn't have the energy for, following these footprints was likely the best chance I had at the moment.

After a few steps, I found myself wishing I had Mouse; he'd be able to find Molly pretty easily. That I couldn't see Molly anywhere beyond where these footsteps were headed worried me somewhat. There was no way that in the time I looked away from her to the time that I looked back that she could have gone anywhere far, but given the amount of time it took for me to get out of the car, and to talk to Charity… She could have made it this far, I suppose.

I followed the prints around the side of the church, and I caught a glimpse of blonde hair. There she was, sitting on a snow-covered bench near a statue of the Virgin Mary. Her back was to me, and her head was bowed. From the angle I was looking, I couldn't really tell if she was praying or if she was just resting her eyes, but I approached anyway. It definitely was Molly there, and her gloves were off. A crucifix peeked out of her hand, attached to the beads of a rosary. That answered that question.

I politely waited for Molly to finish the decade she was on before speaking up. "Hey, you all right? It's cold out here."

Molly opened her eyes and looked to me. "Better here than inside. I just needed some space."

If she had mentioned that to me a few years ago, I'd have scoffed at the notion. Having lived with my brother for the past year and a half, on the other hand? I was definitely starting to understand. There were times where Thomas and I needed to be separate for our own sanity's sake if nothing else.

I sat down on the bench, and looked to her, keeping my eyes focused on her cheeks. "Want to talk about it?"

She looked over to me and I pulled my duster tighter together. It was pretty cold out, and I had a smaller body to worry about.

"It's... Mom. She's trying to… Well she's…" Molly took a breath, pausing to gather her thoughts probably. "Mom's overbearing, and she's too conservative. It's like I'm suffocating sometimes."

I wish I'd known my mother enough to have this sort of complaint about her. As it stood, she'd died not long after giving birth to me, and I knew very little about her beyond what I'd managed to piece together with Thomas's help. The two of us had been left a message by her in our Soulgazes, but that wasn't the same as being raised by her.

Part of that must have reflected on my features somewhat, but I responded to Molly. "From what I understand, Moms do that. She probably only does it because she loves you."

Platitudes give some comfort sometimes, but I wasn't sure this would be enough for Molly.

"She wouldn't understand; I'm going through a lot…" Molly said, keeping something vague. "You probably don't either. I just need to have space sometimes."

"I get that." I said with a smile. "Sometimes I need some space from my brother. I don't usually come out in the snow to pray though."

"It… helps me calm down a bit. The praying, that is." Molly put her rosary in her pocket. "It helps me think of a time when my mother wasn't trying to run my life."

I nodded. While you wouldn't really find me in a church for a reason other than helping out Forthill or relating to a case, I did believe in the Almighty. I'd seen too much and knew too much about the good that Michael and Sanya did to believe otherwise. The Almighty and I just weren't exactly on speaking terms, mostly due to my stubbornness, to be honest.

"Well, maybe it might be possible for you to talk it over with her." I suggested. "Just keep in mind that she loves you."

"But she won't understand!" Molly's outburst had me reaching out my hand to try to calm her.

"It's okay. You could help her to understand. Talk with her." I said, gesturing back toward the church. "She asked me to find you and bring you back safe. She was genuinely worried."

Molly sighed, and she stood up from the bench. "Guess I should go back. The Jawas probably are getting worried too."

She offered me a hand up, which honestly felt odd to me. I was used to being the person who helped the other person up, but this time was the opposite. I grabbed Molly's exposed hand and then a shiver went through me that had nothing to do with the cold. Molly probably felt something similar, given that she actually visibly shivered in front of me. I doubted she knew exactly what it was she felt there, but I knew.

Pulling myself to my feet, I smiled at Molly. "Thanks for the hand up. Let's get you back to your mother."

Molly nodded, and the two of us headed back toward the parking lot entrance. My mind raced about Molly. What had happened made more sense now, but my new knowledge left me with one hell of a conundrum. How was I going to tell Michael and Charity that their daughter was a practioner?

* * *

The walk back with Molly had been mostly silent. I kept going over it in my head. Molly had magic. She had the potential for a _lot_ of magic. If what I felt was right, she could easily make the White Council with the proper tutelage, but from what I could tell, she hadn't had it long. Magic snuck up on you sometimes. Hell's Bells, I still remembered the first time that I had done any sort of magic. I'd been attempting a long jump, and I wanted to win. I wanted to win so hard, that I broke every county record and possibly one of the state records with how far I managed to jump. Of course, two weeks later, my record had been expunged. Obviously I hadn't been able to jump that far. Obviously, someone was seeing things, but I knew. Justin did too, and so did… Elaine.

I shook my head as I walked. Molly's situation wasn't unique. Many young practitioners tried to keep it hidden from their parents. Magic can be pretty scary and hard to understand. Molly definitely had enough of a hold on her own magic to veil on command, something I struggled with myself, and I'm a wizard. Still, I never really got the chance to tell my parents, and my guardian at the time knew more or less instantly what had happened when the school had called him. That's what started my training in magic, and he became my mentor. Molly needed a mentor, if only to keep her out of trouble. I didn't want to have Molly be the first warlock I brought before the Council if I could avoid it. I'd have to let her parents know, preferably when she wasn't around so that together we could broach the subject.

"Miss, I just realized you never told me your name," Molly said, stopping her trek. "How do I know Mom really sent you to find me?"

"Hell's Bells, kid, now you start with the paranoia?" I asked sardonically.

"Kid? You don't look all that much older than me!" Hoo boy, I needed to diffuse this some. That was some energy output she was generating with that temper. I thrust out my hand, splaying out my fingers, and I channeled some of that energy through myself and into the ground. Whoa. Okay, that was new. Despite the anger tinging it, it actually felt pretty good. Molly's face paled. "What the?"

"I'm a bit older than I look, Molly," I said, my voice sounding a bit odd to my ears. Of course, given my current status, that wasn't entirely unexpected. "To answer your question, I'm a bleeping wizard."

Color returned to Molly's cheeks, and she looked me over in confusion. "Harry?"

"Yep," I said, popping the p sound. "Though how you manage to get that from what I said and look like…"

"Please," Molly said, some humor returning to her voice. "No self-respecting girl would wear that kind of duster, at least not one that long."

"It's mine," I said. "I shouldn't be like this for too much longer, so…"

I trailed off and looked back toward the church. "Let's get you back to your mom."

"Does she know it's you?"

"Yes." I sighed. "I'm supposed to be the investigator here. She was worried about you when you pulled that Houdini act."

Molly frowned. "She–"

"Wouldn't understand. You said. I do, however," I said, and I put on my best imitation of a British Accent. "Yer a wizard, Molly. Or at least you could be."

"You… you really think so?"

"White Council level, one day. You can veil pretty well. Even fooled me from my position in the car. Missed a couple things though, but that comes with practice." I started walking, expecting her to keep up with me easily. Damn shorter legs. At least I was still taller than– Stars and Stones, Murphy was going to laugh her ass off. "But, you need some training, kid."

"I've been looking… trying to find out things," Molly said.

"Where at?"

"Library, mostly. Barnes and Noble too."

"No occult shops?" I asked.

"No… I've never been brave enough to go in."

"Right. We'll handle that," I said. "First, however, you need to tell your parents."

"No! I can't do that!" Molly exclaimed. "They'll… they won't…"

"Understand. Yes, I've got that, but they love you, kid. If you'd like, I can tell them. Recommend some people for you to apprentice under. Make a few calls."

"And what if… what if I want you, Harry?" Molly cleared her throat. "As my teacher, I mean."

"Molly, you don't…" I sighed. "I'll talk with your Mom and Dad. We'll work something out."

The two of us made it to the church parking lot, where Charity immediately ran over and hugged her daughter.

"Oh, thank God…" Charity said as she wrapped her arms around Molly, and I smiled. Reuniting family always gave me a warm fuzzy feeling inside, and it was a little more pronounced this time. Charity turned her head toward me from the hug. "Thank you, Mist–… Miss–… Mister Dresden. For finding her so quickly."

"It's what I do." I said, and at that moment, a familiar pickup truck pulled into the parking lot. I tensed slightly, my formerly gloved left palm tingled as a reminder of the reason I hadn't been to see the truck's driver in over two years. Pushing back thoughts of Lasciel, I awaited the driver's exit from his truck.

The truck parked, and out stepped Michael Carpenter. The man was almost as tall as I had been, and he had a hell of a lot more muscle. He had the kind of face that promised honesty and kindness to you but could easily kick the crap out of you if you offered him some sort of violence. To this day, I still wasn't entirely sure how he managed that, something maybe about his jawline, but his kindness showed down through his soul. You could see it in the warmth of his grey eyes. Today, he wore a pair of dark denim jeans and skier's sweater. He smiled upon seeing his wife and daughter hugging.

The passenger-side door opened as well, revealing a dark-skinned man, similarly-tall and built. He wore a pair of cargo khakis and a looser jacket than Michael, and his face spoke of hard times with the hope for better ones. This was Sanya. I'd met him once before, a couple years ago, the first time that I'd encountered Denarians.

The two were Knights of the Cross, similar to what Shiro had been. Michael wielded the Sword of Love, _Amoracchius_ , and Sanya, the Sword of Hope, _Esperacchius_. While Michael lived here, the last time both of them had been in Chicago together was when the Denarians actually were in town.

"Charity, Molly, it is good to see you," Sanya said. "Who is your young, pretty friend?"

Molly buried her face in her mother's arms, and her shoulders were shaking. I swear Charity was cracking a smile as well, though she managed to keep from laughing.

"Sanya," Charity said. "This is–"

"Harry?" Michael asked. "Holy Mother, is that you?"

I blinked. I swear, I was going to have to get a sign. Or at least new business cards.

Sanya walked over to me, towering a few inches over my new height. "Harry. You have shrunk, my friend. Is this common for wizards?"

"Not… exactly…" I said. "Trying to figure it out, mostly."

Sanya nodded. "Very strange. I am not sure how I may be of help, but if you need it, I will be available. First, however, I must go talk with Father Forthill."

"See you, then." I waved the Russian off, and turned toward Michael, who still was a little pale.

"We'll head inside too, Michael. Don't be too long." Charity ushered Molly inside where the rest of her children were.

"Harry," Michael said again as he approached. "Just what happened?"

"I don't really rightly know," I said. "Was working a case, and then poof."

"Poof?"

"Technical term. I was in a fictional town, during fictional events in a fictional person's body," I said. "When I returned here, well…"

I gestured to myself.

"Do you have any leads?" Michael asked, looking a bit concerned.

"Not yet. It's been less than six hours since I've woken up like this, and I still… I haven't eaten in two days, Michael."

"That is a problem. You should remedy that. I'm sure that Father Forthill has something you can–"

"I'm going to Burger King after we're done here."

"We?"

"Warden Chase and I. We're leaving a… possible witness… here with Father Forthill. She's seen some of the things that are going on here, and she was attacked this morning by a schizofiend."

"A what?"

"Schizofiend. Half chlorofiend, half troll."

"Chlorofiend?"

"Plant monster," I said. "She's a bit shaken up, and I think she needs to calm down a bit before we come back and talk to her more. But what she mentioned she saw… It's disturbing."

"More disturbing than a half-plant monster half-troll?" Michael asked.

"Being from the fictional world I was in, here." I shook my head. "I just wish I knew more about it."

Michael nodded. "If you need my help in this, you need only ask."

I smiled. "Thanks Michael, that means a lot. I uh… did need to talk to you about another thing though."

"Oh?" Michael asked. "What is it?"

"Your eldest, Molly?" I really had no easy way of doing this, so I ripped off the Band-Aid. "She has magic."

Michael's eyes widened. "You're sure?"

"Positive." I held out a hand. "When two practitioners touch, bare skin to bare skin, a form of energy feedback goes into both of them. It helps identify when someone else is able to do magic of their own, and it can give a taste of the kind of magic that the other person can use, to a trained practitioner. Like a wizard."

"And Molly?"

"She's got some power there. She could even be White Council one day, if she were to learn under the right teacher," I said with a smile. "Believe me, though. She does need a teacher and soon. Nobody should have to find out about magic on their own."

"Are you offering?" Michael asked. "I don't know many wizards outside of you."

I breathed out a sigh. "I could, yes. And she needs it."

"What would it entail?"

"Lessons, mostly," I said. "I'll admit I haven't given it much thought just yet, given the current…" I gestured at my body. "me-ness. But I will think it over, how much she needs, how fast. I just… I think I need to deal with a few things first."

"Like your current situation."

I laughed. "Yeah, that." I turned serious. "I don't want to drag your daughter into this, Michael. Whatever did this to me, they had power. They have power, and this isn't a place for an untrained apprentice."

Michael nodded. "What can I do?"

"You can let Warden Dresden do her job," Cordelia's voice came from the side. "We'll handle it."

"Michael Carpenter, Warden Cordelia Chase." I gestured to the Warden. "Cordelia, this is Michael Carpenter, Knight of the Cross. Wielder of _Amoracchius_. We should be _honored_ to have his help."

"Oh," Cordelia said, blushing slightly. "Sorry, Sir Knight."

Michael smiled. "It is no trouble, Warden. If you have need of my services, Harry, you know where to find me, and when you're done with all of this, we should have a talk."

"Yes," I nodded. "We should."

Michael turned and headed toward the church, and I headed toward the Loaner, gesturing for Cordelia to follow. We entered the Jeep, and buckled up.

"So, now where to?" Cordelia asked.

"Now?" I asked rhetorically. "Now, we get some God Damn Burger King."

* * *

We finally pulled into the Burger King parking lot about ten minutes later. Stars and Stones, it felt like months that I'd been trying to get there, and my stomach felt like it was digesting itself. Like I said to Michael, I hadn't eaten in two days, and I'd missed the Chinese food that my brother was supposed to bring home that evening thanks to what happened at the morgue. Excuse me. I didn't eat that evening because of what had happened at the Forensic Institute. Stupid renaming of things. It was a place where dead bodies were. It was a morgue.

Okay, that was enough thinking about the dead. More thinking about food. I turned off the Loaner, and when Cordelia had left the car, I got out and locked it. I took a look around the lot, and I noticed that Butters's SUV was parked there still, which was a good sign. Given the weather, I was pretty sure that I wouldn't see any motorcycles parked in the lot, but there were a decent amount of cars sitting there.

"So what's so special about Burger King anyway?" Cordelia asked.

I ignored the blasphemer and entered the restaurant. Walking to the counter, I placed my usual order of a Whopper and some fries, but then I paused. I added two orders of chicken nuggets another two Whoppers, and an order of onion rings.

"Would you, uh… like anything to drink with that?" The cashier wasn't exactly looking at my face, or at least I don't think he was. I didn't want to try and soulgaze him, but from the way his eyes were looking… No, that's madness.

"Large Coke, please." I smiled at the cashier, maybe that'd get him looking at the customer in the face rather than a place that I didn't want to be reminded I had right now.

"Okay," the cashier said, and then he told me my total. Lower than I expected, but I wasn't going to question it, so I paid him.

"Thank you very much," I said, and I went to go wait for my number to be called. I looked around, and I nabbed one of the Burger King crowns, sizing it to fit my head.

Cordelia ordered her own food, and I looked around for the other wardens and Butters. There they were, sitting at a corner table, talking to each other and… a familiar blonde woman. I hadn't seen her car in the lot, but I supposed that the snow could have hidden her car some if she'd been here for a while. After all, it had nearly hidden Butters's, and he didn't drive nearly as compact a car as Murphy.

My food was placed on the counter, and I grabbed it then walked over to the table where everyone else was. It was time to face the music, but more importantly, it was time to consume my food.

I placed the tray down on the table and pulled up an empty chair, smiling. "So sorry that we're late. Traffic was terrible and we had an unfortunate detour."

Murphy looked at me, looked at my duster, looked at my clothing, then my face. Her face was unreadable for a few seconds, but a smile started to tug at her lips. It was less than half of that before she started laughing. "Dresden? That's you, isn't it?"

"It's not that funny," I said, looking at my food.

"No, you're right," Murphy said, seemingly calming down. A snort escaped her, and she started to laugh again, or dare I say, giggle? "It's really funny. Big tall, Harry Dresden, now this… You're actually cute like that."

"You mean I wasn't before?" I asked innocently. "I seem to recall–"

"Another word, Dresden, and you'll be eating those burgers through a tube," Murphy cut me off in the nicest way possible. "So, really, what happened?"

"Wish I knew. Best any of us can say is it was some kind of ritual."

"Black magic, for certain," Yoshimo added.

"Just means we need to catch the bad guy," Carlos said. "Shouldn't be too hard with the five of us."

"Six," Murphy said. "I might not be a warden, but I _am_ an officer of the law. Someone messed with a person under my jurisdiction. Plus, we still have murders to solve."

I nodded. "Speaking of, we ran into someone on our way here that might be able to help with that. She said she was friends with Lisa Hendricks."

"She even said she saw something that might be related," Cordelia added as she brought her own food over. "If what she saw was truly there, we should be able to handle it. We'd just need to figure out where she's going to next."

"Murph, meet Warden Cordelia Chase," I said. "Cordy, meet Detective Lieutenant Karrin Murphy. Head of Special Investigations. I work with her a lot when it comes to supernatural related deaths in the city."

"A pleasure," Murphy said, and then she looked at me. I stuffed a fry in my mouth and unwrapped my burger. "Swallow before answering this, but where's this witness?"

I sipped my Coke, swallowing. Cordelia stayed a bit quiet, maybe because I was the superior here. Man, that felt weird. "Tara is staying at St. Mary's for now. Father Forthill's watching her. After I check on a few things at home, I was planning on seeing if she was feeling up for talking."

"I think she'll be up for a bit more than that," Cordelia muttered.

"Okay," Murphy said. "I'll come with you when you go. We can try and get a statement."

"No offense, Murph, but she was spooked. Good reason too, whatever she saw had them send a schizofiend after her."

"A what?" Murphy's voice was joined by a few others at the table.

"You remember the chlorofiend, right?" I asked Murphy.

"The plant monster at the Wal-Mart a few years ago? The one I killed with a chainsaw?"

"And looked damn sexy doing it too," I said, smiling. Murphy reached up her hand and slapped me in the back of the head. While it didn't _hurt_ , per se, it was a bit of a surprise. Usually she couldn't reach that far. "Hey!"

"Stay on point, Dresden," Murphy said. "If I had any doubts…"

"Right. That. The schizofiend was half chlorofiend and half ogre. Or troll. It was a bit hard to tell given the division."

"Those aren't natural, are they?"

I shook my head. "Was a combination of Summer and Winter Fae. Split right down the middle."

"Just like our victims," Murphy said.

"Oh, that reminds me, uh, Lieutenant Murphy, Harry," Butters said. "We got an ID on the male victim, and it was confirmed once we were able to get through to his parents."

I blinked. "Sorry we didn't get to go through the full examination, Butters."

"Nah, it's okay. I'm just glad you're up and awake right now, Harry."

"So, the ID?" Murphy asked. "CSI didn't really find anything in the room, and the prints had been too ruined to really tell much."

"Yes, well." Butters pushed his glasses up. "The victim, his name was Lawrence Astor."

"Astor, you mean like _those_ Astors?" Murphy asked.

I blinked. "I thought the Astors only had one child, a daughter."

"There's more than just that bit of Astor family, Harry," Murphy said. "Dominic Astor has an older brother. And apparently he had a nephew."

"So, Larry was Lawrence Astor then," I said, frowning. I picked up another fry and ate it. "Interesting. I'll bring that up with Tara when I talk with her. Maybe we should look up Faith Astor as well. She'd be… what, just turned eighteen by now?"

Murphy shrugged. "I'll go see if I can talk with her, see if she knows anything while you talk with your source."

I nodded. "Now, if we're done with shop talk, I have food to eat."

I picked up the crown I'd sized for myself off my tray and placed it onto my head. Apparently I'd sized it a little too large as it slipped down past my eyes.

"Here, let me help with that, Harry," Murphy said, taking the crown and re-sizing it. She placed it upon my head, and giggled again. "There, now, don't you make a fetching Burger Queen?"

"Shut up." I ate my food.


	12. Chapter 12

Training Daze, A Crossover Fanfic of the Dresden Files

* * *

By Ellf  
Chapter Twelve

* * *

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the intellectual property found within this fanfic. All belong to their respective content creators. Dresden Files is authored by Jim Butcher, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a creation of Joss Whedon.

I left the Wardens, Murph, and Butters at the Burger King so I could do some independent research and talk with my source, or at least that's what I told them. I needed to get a handle on what happened to me, and the only time I'd had to myself since waking up was the limited amount of time I had in the bathroom and bedroom respectively. Well, there was the little bit in the Loaner, but given that Lasciel's shadow had shown up, I wouldn't really count that as proper alone time. I needed to be able to think about what happened and adjust.

I also needed to see what Bob had to say. Bob should have returned home from the time out that I'd given him, but he and my brother had to be wondering why I hadn't come back in two days. Given that Murphy had some sort of idea, I was assuming that Butters also called Thomas to give him an update on what had happened to me, but I probably stayed at his place because of the Wardens. I was none too confident about what would be said if any of the Wardens found out about Thomas, and that he was staying with me. This was one of the reasons I didn't invite any of them back with me, along with needing some alone time.

Thomas being a vampire of the White Court would be an issue, of course. There'd be a lot that the wrong people could do with that information. They could assume that Thomas had me compromised, they could assume that I was a pawn of the White Court, active in the White Council. This assumption would come while we remained at war with the Red Court, of course. However, the worst thing they could assume is that our relationship was the truth, and then they'd try to make me _use_ it. I wouldn't do that to my brother.

I parked the Loaner on my street and looked up in the mirror, brushing some reddish bangs out of the front of my face. Funny. I'd spent the bulk of the time driving focused on anything but my current situation. Of course, given what I'd decided at Butters's place, there really wasn't a hell of a lot that I could do at the moment more than what I was already doing. I was stuck as my current gender unless Bob had an out that didn't involve… Well, anything that I'd have to do something horrible to do. I could live with being a woman if I had to. Fifty percent of the population were women, and they managed just fine. It'd just be nice to be myself again if it was possible.

Shaking my head, then brushing my hair back behind my ear afterward, I stepped out of the Loaner and headed toward my apartment. It looked like Thomas had done the shoveling while I was gone, and he'd even shoveled the walk around the building for Mrs. Spunkelcrief and the Willoughbys. I'd have to thank him for doing so as I wasn't entirely sure I'd be up for it with my new arms. I'd need to check how strong I was later, but I knew that I had to be at least somewhat weaker just due to smaller muscles. Didn't matter though. I'd figure it out.

I descended the steps to my apartment and extended my left hand, letting the familiar tingle of my wards pass through me. I flipped the metaphysical switch that would let me pass through them unharmed and I moved to unlock the front door. I most definitely did not frown at the door's steel frame, but I shoved at it a few times before I got it open enough to wiggle through.

I was greeted at the door by Mister, who took a look at me for half a second before imperiously deciding to do his usual greeting with my shins. However, he ended up rubbing against them afterward, and it felt soft and nice through the material my new pants were made out of.

Mouse walked over from his position in the living room and looked me over. He approached closer and started to sniff at me, taking in my scent. I smiled at my dog, who now came up to just below my shoulders, and he chuffed in greeting, holding out a paw. I took it and Mouse chuffed again, holding out his tongue as I shook it.

"Good boy," I whispered.

"Oh, Harry, is that you?" Thomas's voice rang from the kitchen, and I just noticed the smell of pizza wafting through the apartment. Stars and stones, he'd been out every other time I'd been here the past few days, why'd he have to be here now?

Well, it was now or never. "Yeah, Thomas, it's me…"

I stepped further into the apartment, toward the living room, just as my brother placed the pizza on top of the stove. Thomas wasn't wearing a shirt, just a pair of tight blue jeans that hugged his body in a way that showed off exactly how well built my brother was. My brother's shoulder-length dark hair was currently tied back into a ponytail, and his bluish-gray eyes flicked over at me. My brother had one of those bodies that could have been used to sculpt the gods, and he didn't even work out. Came from being a vampire.

Thomas approached me and I could feel my heart start beating faster as I saw silver flecks go into his eyes. See, I knew consciously how attractive my brother was to women and some men. I'd seen it before, what he can do to them with a glance. How he gets their blood pumping, their bodies ready. It was all a part of the sexual predator that he was. Hell, the rest of his family was no different. I'd been on the receiving end of a come-hither from Thomas's _sister_ , Lara, and that was… hoo boy… very strong. But having experienced that and knowing what it looked like didn't exactly prepare me for what was coming from Thomas other than in an intellectual sense. My body really didn't seem to like the intellectual sense.

I stepped toward the man in front of me, _my brother_ , and I watched as he reached out his arms toward me. Man, I really wanted to be in those arms. I just… No, this was wrong. I wasn't normally attracted to men of any sort, but Thomas was something else. He wasn't just a man… He was—

A low growl interrupted my thoughts as Mouse moved between Thomas and I. My brother blinked a couple times and the silver faded away from his gaze. I locked eyes with him as I pulled out my blasting rod and placed it on the coffee table.

"Thomas, I'm going to ask you once," I said, shuddering. It wasn't so much the attraction to a man that had me reeling as much as the fact that Thomas was my _brother_. I mean, I knew that Lord Raith had done something similar to Thomas's sisters, but… just ugh. If I was going to go for any man, it wouldn't be my brother, not that I wanted to go for men in the first place. "Please never do that again."

"Empty night," Thomas cursed. "It really is you, isn't it Harry?" He turned to… Well, I'm not really sure, because I instinctively held up a hand, and he ended up crashing into a wall of force. Okay, I wasn't entirely sure where that came from, but I wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth

"Now, don't go and do your broodypants thing, mister," I said. "Not when I need to talk with you."

"Broodypants?" Thomas snorted, rubbing his arm from where he bumped it, and he seemed to calm down a little. Good. I didn't want him to think that I held the come-hither against him. I knew it was his Hunger, not really his choice, but he'd had pretty good control to pull it back, with the help of Mouse. "That's an interesting turn of phrase."

"Yeah, I'm full of them." I slipped my duster off and hung it on the coat hanger near the doorway before making my way back to the couch and sitting down. I gave an idle glance to the item in my umbrella stand and frowned. Another mystery to add to the growing pile. Mouse sidled up next to me and laid his head in my lap. I started scratching him behind his ears. I hoped he wouldn't a

"So, you're definitely Harry then," Thomas said, walking over to sit on another couch and look at me in the candlelight. "I suppose I can see it. You look a little like Mom did in our soulgaze. Though I'm not entirely sure why the red highlights."

"They're natural, as far as I can tell," I said idly… and then my face heated up as I realized what I implied. "I mean, not that I've really looked to tell for certain. But given how I got them, they're probably natural…"

"Okay, I think you're going to have to tell me what happened," Thomas said.

So I did. I told him about what had happened since the start of the case, the Janus ritual, the deaths, the trip to Sunnydale in Willow Rosenberg's body, the meeting of Warden Chase and Tara, the mentioning of Glorificus…

"Wait. You're sure she said Glorificus?" Thomas asked.

I nodded. "Definitely. She said that this person was supposed to be dead."

"Well, given that Tara's supposed to be dead too," Thomas mused. "Glory being alive wouldn't be out of the question."

"Okay, so who's Glory?" I asked. "And wait… You're saying Tara's from Sunnydale as well?"

"Willow Rosenberg's girlfriend from Season 4 until Season 6, when she was shot and killed. Of course, this Tara could be just a girl named Tara, but given that she recognized Glory, I'm going to say that's probably not the case." Thomas scratched his chin a little. "And Glory… She's a Hell Goddess. I'm not sure how that translates to actual power here, but she was faster and stronger than Buffy. She also had the ability to drain the sanity out of people by sticking her fingers into their minds."

I shivered, and Mouse moved closer, to put his warm furry body near me. Good dog. Still. A Hell Goddess. That really didn't sound like anything that I wanted to be tangling with… so of course, I was going to be the one tangling with it. Face it, Dresden, you were in this from the moment you spoke with Tara the second time.

"The whole fictional character thing throws me off a little," I admitted.

"And the body doesn't?" Thomas asked.

"It'd do so less if I were taller," I said. "The Council's doing research on seeing if they can help me get back my old self, and they'll probably do some paperwork if I can't."

"That sucks."

"Yeah," I agreed. "But maybe Bob might be able to find something."

"That skull?" Thomas asked. "He'll probably ask you to flash him first."

"He does, and I'll threaten to smash the skull. It's how we bond," I smiled sweetly at my brother. "Still, Bob's a spirit of knowledge. There's probably not much about magic that he doesn't actually know, as long as it's not tied up in those memories I asked him never to access again. Kemmler did one hell of a number on him."

"Right," Thomas said, and then he looked a little thoughtful. "So, when I turned to walk away, what did you do, Harry? I didn't hear you cast a spell."

"I'm… not sure, really," I admitted. "I just didn't want you to leave yet."

"And I slammed into an invisible wall. Maybe Willow had more of an effect on you than the body," Thomas said, standing. "Though I do have to ask, what was Sunnydale like?"

"Warm, mostly. Little hectic with whatever was causing the chaos," I admitted.

"Suppose it would be, that." Thomas scratched his chin. "Wait, didn't you say Tara mentioned something else other than Glorificus?"

"The… Oh. Hell's bells…."

"What?"

"The four glowing eyes. Michael and Sanya being back in town. Glory's working with a Denarian." I stood up sharply and started for my basement. "I _really_ need to talk to Bob."

* * *

The idea of the Denarians back in Chicago made my palm itch as I descended the stepladder into my subbasement. Sure, my left hand was no longer burned, a lovely silver lining to the current situation I found myself in, but that didn't change the thing that had saved my palm. I still had that connection to the coin buried under my basement, covered in cement, and until I found a way to break it, I'd have it up until then.

I looked at my slowly growing model and shook my head. I needed more than that tonight. Still, I wasn't sure how much I was looking forward to this. He might have been a spirit of intellect and had umpteen amounts of knowledge to him, but he was… well… He had his quirks. Quirks that I'd probably come to regret by the time the night was finished, but nonetheless, I'd relied on him in the past and needed him now.

I just hoped he'd answer me.

I glanced to the bleached skull that sat atop the bookshelf in my lab, and said, "Up and at 'em, Bob. We've got work to do."

Orange lights flickered to life inside the skull, and, after making an overly elaborate yawning sound as the skull opened in a parody of the yawn, the skull turned toward me. "Harry? Is that you?"

"Mostly," I said, looking to Bob, and waiting for his inevitable reaction.

"Oh, Harry, this is the nicest gift you could have given me!" Bob sounded positively gleeful. "Learning how to transform yourself into a woman, and then coming down here and showing me..."

"Not helping, Bob." I crossed my arms under my chest and gave the skull a look. "Don't suppose you know a way to fix this?"

"Why would you want to?" Bob asked. "You're young, you're attractive. Why, I bet you'll get even more lucky as you are now than you ever did as a man."

"Not the point," I said, my teeth gritted, and then I let out a small sigh. While it'd be nice to change back, it wasn't the most pressing thing on my plate at the moment. Still, I needed to ask again. "Can you help me change back or not?"

"Mmm… I'm not sure, Sahib. Pardon. Memsahib."

"Let's go with the male pronouns unless I say otherwise, okay?" I suggested to the skull.

"Very well, boss. You said fix it. Meaning you didn't transfigure yourself willingly?" Bob asked, and I shook my head. "Do you have any idea what might have caused it?"

I gave the skull a brief summary of what had happened in Sunnydale along with what I'd felt in the lead-up to it. Then, elaborating on that, I told him about Warden Chase's origins. Cordelia and Tara both were clues as to what had happened to me, even if neither of them was directly responsible. I even let him know about the soulgaze I'd shared with Injun Joe to confirm my identity as myself. Of course, I didn't tell him the specifics about what I'd saw, but Bob needed to know everything I could let him know in order to help.

"So the Senior Council member didn't know what to make of it?" Bob asked.

"No, Injun Joe said he'd need to look into a few things, and from what I've heard, he's one of the best healers and shapeshifters the Council has to offer."

"Right, let me take a closer look," Bob said. "Just put me down on the table, somewhere around where Sears Tower will be when you finish it."

I nodded and walked over to Bob's shelf, reaching upward, and then I frowned as my arms barely fell short of the top of the shelf. I wasn't used to being this short. I might have still been taller than Murphy, but that didn't mean I could reach Bob at the top. No, I needed to find something else I could use to help me get up to him. Ah, there. I hadn't needed to do this since before puberty. I pulled a chair over to the shelf and climbed atop it, carefully grabbing Bob's skull off, holding him facing away from me, and I stepped down off the chair.

"Well, Sahib, your hands are nice and soft now," Bob said. "I noted no glove there, and your hand doesn't quite look like a burned husk."

I placed him down on what would be my model of Chicago when I finished it, and the skull turned to look me over with his orange lights. "Well?"

"Easy now, I'm taking a look," Bob said, looking me over. "Mmm… It might be better if you were to take your top off. I'd be able to see more."

I crossed my arms again and gave the skull a look.

"Well, you certainly have that disapproving look down, Sahib." Bob gave another look over me, orange light passing over my body, and he let out a low whistle. Which, given that he was a skull, was something of a novelty. "Yes, okay. That's… well… I haven't seen something like this before."

Okay. That was… strange. "What do you mean?"

"Well, there's a duality to you now," Bob said. "You're still you, but you've got some extra bits in there that aren't originally from you but are now integrating. The physical change might be a part of that, or it might be a result of the original ritual that pulled you to Sunnydale, California in the first place."

"Okay, so does that mean I can change back?"

"Possibly, but it would take some time and you would need to find out the exact ritual that initialized your change in the first place." Bob made a considering sound. "Of course, that's for a permanent return."

I gestured for him to go on.

"It might be possible for you to _use_ your duality and retake your male form," Bob said. "It's not like such a thing hasn't been done before by other wizards. Self-transfiguration isn't impossible, nor is it against your mortal Laws of magic."

"Yes, but it's easy to screw up," I said. "Doing it wrong could leave me a pile of goo."

"Which is why you should just stay the way you are." Bob's eyes practically twinkled in the sockets of the skull. "I am looking out for your best interest, Sahib."

"Yeah, and you want a girl to ogle." I shook my head. "Anyway, current form aside, we do still have a murderer, whatever created that schizofiend, and a twofer of a Denarian and a hell goddess to worry about."

"And they're all probably linked to your current form," Bob said, somehow pulling off a sage nod despite not having the leverage. I've long since inured myself to his movement-based antics. "Sunnydale too, it seems, with both Chase, Tara and this Glorificus."

"So, what do you know about hell gods?"

"Not much more than you do, Harry," Bob said, and I could tell that the idea was subtly irking him about as much as it excited him. After all, how often did a Spirit of Intellect run into information that he didn't know yet? Still, it bothered me. The murders, the schizofiend, my change, and even my time in Sunnydale. It didn't add up. Why murder Lisa Hendricks? Unless she wasn't the main target.

I doubted the bodies were there simply to fuel the ritual, at least not the way they had been killed. If they were, the killer would have used something more traditional to chop them apart and wouldn't have used magic to glue them back together. While the deaths spoke to a duality, they also spoke of purpose. The symbolism was stronger than I'd expect for an average ritual, which obviously meant that the ritual was beyond what I'd expected. I'd need more information about the victims, which of course meant speaking to some people.

"Well, maybe you can break down for me what you do know," I said, looking to Bob.

"Okay, Boss." The skull seemed to smirk. "Of course, just because I don't know much more than you doesn't mean that I don't know more than you. You are, after all, a bit thick about things. So, when it comes to gods, let me do a refresher."

"Bob," I said in a voice as low as I could make it, only to be answered by a chuckle from the skull.

"That's adorable, Harry," Bob said. "But more seriously, most gods and other deities are beings that reside in the Nevernever, under their own dominions, separate from Faerie. Sometimes they intermingle, and other times they don't. Back when you mortals were still banging rocks together, before the White God did His whole little I AM bit, gods were popular everywhere, getting their power from their worshippers and gaining influence on the world."

"Right, and sometimes the gods don't have as many worshippers anymore, but with the right ritual, they can be contacted and power can be requested from them."

"Just like a vending machine," Bob said. "But the difference is, those gods have power constraints keeping them from interfering without worshippers. Of course, the term worshipper is fairly loose. I'm sure there are gods walking around the material realm among you. They're probably taking jobs that they can get a lot of people watching them and cheering them on."

"What, like movie stars or athletes?" I asked.

"You can't deny that Angelina Jolie is like Aphrodite," Bob said with a leer. "Of course, your new form is almost better."

"Let's move away from that. Glorificus isn't like that," I said, redirecting the subject. Why did my perverted spirit of intellect hav eto perv on me?

"No, she isn't, but she comes from another reality, much like the version of Sunnydale that you were sent to."

"Okay, so does that mean she's from Outside?" I asked, worrying about the Seventh Law a bit.

"Not precisely, but the Hellish aspects of the Nevernever do tend to be closer to the Outer Gates. If her backstory is like the show, than she comes from an area of the Nevernever that she ruled alongside others. In all likelihood, her physical manifestation isn't fully stable, since she has no worshippers here."

"Explains the brain sucking," I said. "Makes me wonder how she even got here."

"That I can't tell you, Sahib. Maybe your little brain buddy might be able to," Bob responded.

"I've asked the Shadow already, and she doesn't seem to know. Apparently the real thing avoided alternate realities."

"Interesting." Whatever else Bob was going to say was cut off as the phone rang. I heard my brother answer the phone.

After a few seconds, his voice echoed out. "Harry, it's Murphy. She wants to talk to you."

"We'll continue this conversation later, Bob," I said as I headed up the stepladder. "I'll need you to do some things for me in a bit."

"Yes ma'am," Bob said cheekily, and his eyes winked out. I shook my head and made my way through the trapdoor separating my subbasement from my basement apartment.

My brother held the phone out toward me, and I forced down more feelings of unnatural origin as I walked by him. He probably was a little hungry, and that was something I really didn't want to have to deal with. I took the phone from him and leaned against the wall.

"Hello?" I said, making it almost a question.

"Harry?" Murphy replied.

"No, I'm his little sister, but I can take a message," I said with a smirk to my voice.

"Dresden, times are serious," Murphy said.

"Yeah, I know. I've lost a foot in height." I shook my head. "What's up Murph?"

"Well, I went to check in on the Astor family to see if I could talk with Faith," she said, her voice clearly building up to something.

"And? But?" I urged her to go on.

"Her parents haven't seen her in three months," Murphy said. A lump formed in my stomach. Faith Astor had been my first major case that involved the police. Finding that girl and dealing with the troll that we'd inadvertently run into also was how I met Murphy. Of course, her parents tried to blame Nick Christian and I for her running away, saying we kidnapped her, but she set the police straight. "They said she disappeared around Halloween, and she hadn't been back since."

"Did they have any clues?" God, Halloween. If she'd been involved… or been hurt by anything this Halloween, I'd have to break the Fifth Law so I could kill Corpsetaker again. And Grevane. And… actually, I'd leave Cowl dead.

"Just that she'd been spending a lot of time with her cousin before she disappeared," Murphy said. "They apparently tried to check to see if her cousin was hiding her, using a private investigator, but they'd come up with nothing useful. Lawrence Astor hadn't been hiding her at his place, at least not since she left home."

I pursed my lips, thinking. "They mention anything about friends, coworkers, other people that might have known her?"

"What do you think I am, Dresden? A rookie?" Murphy asked incredulously. "She knew Lawrence's girlfriend quite well. Judging from the pictures, she wanted to be more than just friends with Lisa Hendricks, but Lawrence was in the way."

"She's not a suspect, Murph," I said. "She didn't do it."

"I know that, Harry." I could almost hear Murphy roll her eyes. "Still, it'd give her a motive if she were involved."

"How's she look nowadays anyway?" I remembered a little girl, ten years old, hair in dark pigtails and feisty as all hell.

"Apparently she wanted to look a bit different than her parents. She dyed her hair," Murphy said. "Not quite my color, but she's a nice honey blonde with dark roots."

Blonde, friends with Lisa Hendricks, and a cousin of Larry Astor… I was making a connection, but I wasn't too sure on how much I wanted it to be right. The coincidences were a bit too much to ignore, however.

"Okay," I said. "Could you come pick me up, Murph?"

"Sure. Where are we going?" Murphy asked. I smiled, glad she trusted me enough to go along with me.

"St. Mary of the Angels." Forthill might know something, and while Michael might have as well, I was fairly confident in my deduction given the facts I now had.

"Why there?" I could almost hear Murphy's eyes narrowing.

"It's a church. Where else would we find Faith?"

* * *

AN: Been a while, I know. But this isn't dead.


End file.
